Judith was the first child of Hugh Norman (always known as Norman) Mockett and Teddy (born Edna Josephine) Millar.

SECOND GENERATION

Nicholas Mockett and Elizabeth Sawyer

Nicholas (son of John and Faithful Mockett) was born in 1671 and baptised on 12th November 1671. He married Elizabeth Sawyer on 6th January 1694 and they had four children that I have definitely been able to trace.  Elizabeth died in 1786

Their children were:

Stephen baptised on 7th June 1696  in Deal. Stephen married Elizabeth Sackett, daughter of Robert Sackett and Elizabeth on 9th June 1722 in Deal

John in 1697

Mary in 1698

Abigail in 1707

THIRD GENERATION

Stephen Mockett and Elizabeth Sackett

Stephen, baptised 7th June 1696, married Elizabeth Sackett, daughter of Robert and Elizabeth Sackett on 9th June 1722. Elizabeth was born in Deal in 1698 and died in 1796.  They had the following 7 children`

Stephen  in 1723

Joshua in 1724  and who died in 1728

Elizabeth in 1727

Mary in 1731

Thomas in 1733, Thomas married Ann Hulk daughter of Jno Hulk and Ann Hulk on 4th May 1759 in Deal. Ann was born in 1733

Catherine in 1738

Joshua Mockett in 1736 .

FOURTH GENERATION

Joshua Mockett and Elizabeth Jordan

Joshua was married three times. He married his first wife Elizabeth Jordan on 11th June 1759 and she died before 1771. Joshua died in 1814. Joshua was a mariner

Joshua and Elizabeth had five children as follows:

Stephen in 1760

Joshua in 1762 .   I believe that son Joshua ran the Rising Sun public house in Kingsdown, Deal  according to this article   http://www.dover-kent.com/rising-sun-kingsdown.html 

I believe that the son Joshua died in 1866 according to this entry

PASSING AWAY.

Published 1st December 1866.
Four of the old inhabitants of Deal have gone to their rest during the past week. Capt. TRYON, R.N., Mr.JOSHUA MOCKETT, a member of the Town Council, and for many years landlord of the Royal George, Mr.JOHN BAX, for many years stone mason in Queens Street; and Mr.JAMES LARKINS, shoemaker, Middle Street – men who were all known in the town and much respected in the several positions they occupied in life.

John in 1764

Thomas in 1766

Mary in 1767

Joshua then married Sarah Stanturn on 30th July 1771 in Deal but she died before 1772 when he then married Hannah Taverner  on 2nd October 1772. They had the following children.

Ann Mockett in 1774

William Mockett in 1777

FIFTH GENERATION

THOMAS MOCKETT AND MARY DENNE

Thomas was baptised on 5th February 1766 at St Leonards Church, Deal. He married Mary Denne on 6th January 1787 at the same church. Here is a copy of the entry

They had 8 children who were:

1/ Thomas Denne baptised on 15th January 1790

2/ Mary Anne baptised on 20th June 1792 but who I believe must have died before 1796 when a sister was born and given the same name

3/ Elizabeth baptised on 30th July1794

4/ Mary Ann baptised 4th June 1796 who again must have died before 1799

5/ William baptised 13 June 1798

6/ Stephen baptised 13 February 1788 who married Ann Foster. I found this very interesting article about Stephen so thought I should include it in this post

Stephen Mockett

Beach Street
Nelson Street
31 Duke Street
11 Duke Street

Occupation: Chemist & Druggist & Lecturer

Stephen was born in 1788, the son of Thomas Mockett and Mary Denne; he married a local girl Ann Foster in March 1811 and settled in Beach Street where the previous year he had taken out a lease on a property with fellow Chemist and Druggist, Richard Smith. Here he continued to trade until debt caught up with him.

An Insolvent Debtor

It was at least 1815 when he started to accumulate both personal and business debts ending in bankruptcy in 1821.

Between 1815 and 1821 he had run-up grocery and clothing bills of over £14 and business bills for medicines and perfumery of over £200. He had also borrowed money from various gentlemen of the town and owed £130 to Richard Smith for his share, of four years rent, on the Beach street property and a further  £157.10 also to Richard Smith when the Beach Street property was left empty. This was probably when Stephen and his family had moved to Great Mongeham. A further £415 was owed to John Fagg on an unpaid mortgage on a property in Duke Street which is curiously where, Stephen’s parents, Thomas and Mary, lived until about 1824 when they moved to Lower Street.

According to a copy of the schedule filed with the Court for the Relief of Insolvent Debtors in November 1821, which we found in the archives of Deal Maritime & Local History Museum, Stephen  “…a Chemist and Druggist and Occasional Lecturer on Chemistry” had debts that amounted to  £1,010 4s 6d   ( approx £58,000 in 2019 ) owing to 38 creditors. This was only marginally offset by the £18 19s 6d that was actually owed to him!

Dover Castle Gaol

Stephen entered Dover Castle Gaol for debtors in October or November 1821 with only 12s in his pocket, this was soon taken from him to help pay for his “maintenance” during his imprisonment which far from covering all his needs meant that he would have needed help to survive. Especially as it was quite usual for prisoners to be charged for food, drink, and bedding. If they were lucky they could work, providing it did not interfere with prison regulations’ but for most in a small gaol such as that within Dover Castle, this wouldn’t have been possible. So to help those in greatest need ‘An Act for the Relief of Poor Debtors and others confined within the Goal of Dover Castle’ was passed in 1814. This brought £300 a year to the prison authorities from the Cinque Ports to provide bedding, medicines and food for those who could not provide for themselves. Prisoners also begged for money from visitors who were common in the summer. Apparently, there was a grating on the second floor through which they could let down a purse in which visitors would then place money. 

Stephen may not have had to resort to begging as his schedule states that “I have been otherwise supported during my confinement by the benevolence of my friends.” 

We can only assume that his wife and children were also cared for by ‘the benevolence’ of their family or friends as little was left to them. According to the schedule, they did at least have some  “Wearing Apparel” and items of bedding and furniture as in total they were valued at less than £20. This were all itemised under ‘Excepted Articles and the Values Thereof’ on the Schedule.

Detaining Creditor

Henry Tritton Reaks, to whom Stephen owed £18 3s 6d, was his Detaining Creditor. Although we haven’t found a definitive meaning for this, it does appear that it was Henry who had Stephen arrested and ‘detained.’

In 1813 an Act of Parliament had been passed for the ‘Court for Relief of Insolvent Debtors.’ This allowed debtors in prison to appeal for their release after two months during which time a schedule of debt was  prepared. At the hearing they were examined and once an agreement to surrender their property and belongings were made they were then released. But they would still be liable to pay off what remained of their debts. It is probably safe to assume, therefore,  that Stephen’s case followed along these lines and that he was arrested and in gaol by the end of October and released, as the schedule states, on 29 December 1821. At which point he still owed a total of £595 4s 6d which, in today’s money, is just over £34,000!  In March 1822 a meeting was called by the Dover Solicitors, Knockers, to start the process of assigning the proceeds of Stephens estate and belongings. Then as now legal proceedings take time and in 1827, five years later his real estate went up for sale.

Exactly when Stephen gave up being a Chemist and Druggist we don’t really know but according to the schedule, the Beach Street Chemist premises had been unoccupied from about 1816. He certainly did not return to that trade on his release from gaol choosing instead to rely on his abilities as a lecturer to support himself and his family. We see from the Kent newspapers, from at least 1834, that he was is in high demand giving lectures all over the county in astronomy, chemistry and philosophy. He pleased his audiences with experiments by turning fluids into solids and creating a flame underwater. Although these may seem ‘tricks’ to entertain, these lectures were for the serious and interested and Stephen seemed to be a natural teacher giving, as was reported in the papers “…clear and lucid explanations…” and appealing to all classes with “..elocutionary tact.”

`The Dover Museum and Philosophical Institution were the founders of the Dover Museum in 1836. The Institute aimed to promote “literary and scientific knowledge by means of a museum, library and reading room, conversazioni and classes.”  This was still the case when just over twenty years later, in 1858, Stephen ably closed the season of lectures held by the Institution.

The Bell Inn

Stephen Foster,  his eldest son, followed him onto the lecture circuit giving similar lectures but by 1847 he had taken over The Bell Inn on Robert Street.

There was a Bowling Green attached to the Inn, which was extended in 1850. An additional room was added, too, in which was held a celebration supper for his customers who all appeared to have greatly enjoyed themselves, the elder Stephen included.

6/ Mary baptised 27 October 1799

7/ Sarah baptised 1st October 1806

In 1841 Thomas and Mary are living in Deal both aged 75 and have their daughter Mary with them aged 40.  Thomas was a baker.

I am only writing this because I realize that I wish I had asked my parents more about their lives and so feel it might be a good idea to put down in writing about mine in case my children should ever feel like knowing more.

I have been so lucky in my life. I had a lovely family with very caring and loving parents, then a very happy married life. Sadly, Nicholas died too young, but I was left in a very comfortable position financially and was able to travel and do what I wanted as a widow.

The first memory that I have is of meeting my father for the first time in my life. I was aged four and a  half before he was able to return from the desert and Italy after the war ended so I remember seeing him for the first time in my life. Not something many people can say.

My mother and I were living at 12 Chaucer Road, Broadstairs,  which was the house that my parents rented when they were married. My mother refused to be evacuated after the war started as she reasoned that my father would be able to picture where we were. He was away for nearly five years. War had broken out only 5 months after they married and my mother was 3 months pregnant with me when he left for the desert.

12 Chaucer Road was tiny. A terraced house. I always understood that it was  built for the  people working on the railways. It was not mentioned in the 1891 census but is in the 1901 so was built around 1895. As you went in the front door, you were in a tiny hallway with stairs straight ahead of you. The first door on the right went into the front room which was the lounge. This tended  to be used on special occasions as we did most things in the dining room behind it. This led into the kitchen which had a door down to the cellar and one into the larder and the third door into the back garden. The garden (just a cemented over yard) was also tiny and had a gate into an alleyway. This alley way was walked a great deal by my mother when she was in labour with me – bombs or not. Cheryl and I were lucky to be able to look over the house a few years ago. Cheryl moved from there at the age of 2 and so did not remember it but I was aged 16. I was shocked to see how small it was. I think the total floor area was smaller than the lounge at North Goodwin House and to think that 6 of us were living there at one time.

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The day that my father returned, we had spent up at the railway station waiting to meet him. However, he did not arrive, so my mother took me home and was just putting me to bed in the middle bedroom at number 12, when there was a whistle through the letter box. She disappeared and when she came back it was with my father who was in uniform and carrying a black china doll under his arm for me that I called Dinah . The next morning I apparently just went into their bedroom and climbed into the middle of the bed with them. There was never any awkwardness between my father and I, probably because my mother had always made a point of including him in the family. If I was given a sweet (a luxury) then we put one for my father in a bowl in front of his photo.

We did not have much money. My father had worked at Daniel’s Estate Agents,  which I believe was at Station Approach Road in Broadstairs, before the war, but they had not kept his job open for him. He started work at Blackburns furniture shop, working in the shop and also doing the book keeping. He had learned to type when still at school. He then graduated into the funeral directing side and attended classes to qualify in funeral directing and embalming. He came home each day for lunch.

Not long after the war ended, and after they removed the barbed wire from the beach,  my parents bought a beach hut which we had at Viking (then called Main) Bay close to the pier. We spent all summer down there. Often we would go down after breakfast, have lunch and tea and then families would get together to play rounders and cricket if the tide was out. It really did not matter what the weather was like. I have many memories of swimming in the sea during a thunder storm and my parents or Grandmother sitting in the beach hut. The original hut was just a wooden frame with canvas sides and roof and a sand floor.  Many years later they bought a wooden hut. We were not allowed any form of cooking in the hut so my parents would buy a tray of tea from Gay’s cafe just behind us.  This is the one facing you as you walk down Harbour street, On the right hand side they sold ice creams and candy floss. Their’s was the first candy floss in the country.

To earn money, my mother would do bed and breakfast in the summer months. As the house only had three bedrooms, one of which was tiny, they slept in the dining room on a put-u-up sofa – called a sofa bed nowadays.  I think that my two brothers and I shared a bedroom.  We did not have a bathroom so she took jugs of hot water up to their bedrooms to wash and trays of early morning tea. They had a large bowl in the bedroom with pink flowers on it and I still have that bowl. For many years I used it to make the Christmas puddings in and it is now up in my garage roof. I always understood that it came from my father’s parents.

She served their breakfast in the front room which was in fact our lounge, Looking back, it must have been a very hard time for my parents, but then after the war nobody seemed to have much money.  We had two families who came back for several years, called the Holah’s who had two daughters and the Chittie’s who had two sons.

My brother, Hugh, was born on April 20th 1946 and followed 18 months later by my brother Richard on October 29th 1947. I remember my mother being in labour with Richard and pacing the kitchen. I was obviously went to bed and the next morning, I was called into her bedroom to see the new baby.

Things were so different in those days. Isabella often asks me about things that have changed so I think I will put some of them in here.

Firstly, we had no bathroom. We just had a toilet upstairs and one outside off the garden and the only tap was over the sink in the kitchen. Each weekend, my parents would carry a  metal bath into the dining room in front of the fire and we all bathed in that. The water had to be carried in from the kitchen where it was heated by an Ascot water heater or on the stove in saucepans.

We did have an inside  toilet and also one outside which one accessed from the back garden. I remember that if money was tight, my parents would hang squares of newspaper from a piece of string instead of toilet paper. Our weekly bath was a delight and one felt so wonderful afterwards. Later – in about 1952- when we had our first television we would all sit and watch it after our bath and our treat for the evening was an orange.  However, until about 1950 we had no electricity in the house and our lighting was by gas light.

What excitement it was to have electricity installed in the house. We could just flip a switch and lights came on!  We only had about two or three  sockets in the house but then we did not have things like Hoovers and floor polishers etc.

To do her weekly wash, my mother had a copper which was basically a large saucepan which heated up the water by gas. To clean the clothes she used a dolly which was basically a large wooden stick to push the clothes around. Mother then had to remove the water from the clothes by putting through a mangle.

After we had electricity my parents started to hire a washing machine on  a Saturday as it would not be collected until Monday and so gave them the whole of Sunday to do the weekly wash. I clearly remember my father helping my mother to do it. It was  a single tub and did not spin. To get rid of excess water one had to put it through a mangle. These photos will give you some idea of the mangle and machine.

I mentioned that my father would often help to do the washing. He was great like that and my cousin, Audrey Mockett, told me that she came to stay with my parents and my father would come home from work and scrub the kitchen floor for my mother. She remembered him as being a lovely man and so different to her father Frank.

One day when I was aged about 2, my mother was doing the washing and found that I had put my hand in the mangle. As a result I lost all my finger nails on my right hand and split the little finger open.

Other differences between then and the modern world? No television until we rented one for the King’s funeral and then my father  purchased one for the Coronation. We were about the first to have a TV and that was partly due to my Grandparents dying and leaving money to my father which he used to buy the car and a TV. I remember the room being full of people from the street and my teacher who had come in to watch the coronation.

We had no phone and people had to go out to a phone box to make a call. We had one in the hall installed before others in the road had a phone simply because it was needed for my father to take calls out of work hours when someone had died. It was a party line. This meant that another family shared the same phone line and if they were using the phone, we could hear their conversations and would have to wait for them to finish before we were able to make our calls.

Shopping was also totally different as we had no supermarkets. In fact the first one in Broadstairs was Tesco which was in the shop in the High Street that it has just moved from. We had a small shop called The Vale Stores run by a couple called Partridge and who employed Lena to run it. They sold butter which was measured out by Lena and the same with other foods. All food was weighed out and not prepackaged. We did not have any plastic in those days so it was all sold in grease-proof paper or brown paper bags. One always took ones own basket to the shop.  We did not have any plastic and I remember when nylon was first made. Everyone wanted nylon clothes – cardigans and jumpers especially – as they were so much easier to wash and needed almost no ironing.

I started school at St Mildred’s School in Broadstairs a few days after  I had  turned 5. It was only a short walk there and after the first day, I walked to school on my own, coming home each day for my lunch. Hugh started there just before I left when I was aged 11, and I can remember feeling so proud when I was milk monitor and took the milk into his classroom.

My father took on other jobs to earn extra money. He worked at the Tote at the Dumpton Greyhound track on race evenings and also at Marchesi restaurant where he did the book keeping for them. He did these jobs to be able to afford for us to have some private lessons before taking our 11 plus.

When I heard that I had passed my 11 plus, I was allowed to go home to tell my parents. I ran to Chaucer Road and told my mother and then to Blackburns to tell my father (no phones in those days). I was in trouble when I got back to school for being away so long. His extra work certainly paid off as both my brothers and  I passed to the Grammar School. Cheryl, did too later on. However, she was not happy at Clarendon and eventually transferred to Dane Court. Here she said she was in paradise as they had such marvelous facilities for art, which Clarendon House did not have.

Aged 11, I started at Clarendon House, the grammar school in Ramsgate. I remember the first morning clearly. I did not know where the school was but had been told to get the 52 bus at Dawson’s Corner to Ramsgate and to follow the other girls to get to the school. I used the bus for the first couple of years and then started to cycle every day. My bicycle had a child seat on the back and so when Cheryl arrived and was old enough I would cycle home from Ramsgate with her on the  back of my bike after my mother had come into Ramsgate to meet me.

When I was 12, my Aunty Bunty and Uncle Alfred were planning a holiday in Italy. They were going to stay with people Alfred had met during the war. They then had 4 children: Paul, Mary, Elizabeth and Hilary. Hilary was a bit young to take with them so they arranged for her to stay with my parents and me to go to Italy with them. I was both excited and homesick as I had never been away from my parents for long. It was however, a lovely trip with Aunty and I going to Rome for a few days on our own. She was a devout catholic and I remember going to the Scala Sancta and having to go up those stairs on my knees. No fun when you had the bony knees that I had.

I was 14 and had always stirred the Christmas pudding wishing for a baby sister. One day the Welfare office rang my mother’s friend Dee Double who had adopted a little boy called Christopher to see if she would foster a 5 week old baby girl. Dee was running a boarding house in St Georges Road and was too busy and just happened to mention it to my mother that afternoon. Mum immediately said we would look after her as she would otherwise go into an orphanage. The most beautiful baby arrived the next morning. This was in mid June and I so clearly remember the excitement when I got off the bus at Victoria Gardens and ran along the beach to the beach hut where this baby was in a borrowed green pram. She was beautiful and I fell in love with her immediately. How lucky we were to have her and to be able to adopt her five years later. The adoption went through on my last day at University which I missed it to come home and the day after my Grandmother Alice Maud Millaar died. We all went to Pierremont Hall for it. I was not allowed in but afterwards Cheryl came racing up to fling her arms round me and said “Now we really are sisters”.  Cheryl always knew that she was fostered and when we started the adoption proceedings, she would go through my mothers purse and Dad’s pocket to save up the threepenny bits to buy it (It was free!)

My mother invariably used to come to Ramsgate on a Friday afternoon, by bus as she did not drive in those days,  to look round the shops and I would meet her at Lyons cafe (the waitresses were known as nippies during the war). She would have a cup of tea and I had orange squash with hot water. Such a treat!

One day, when cycling home with Cheryl on the back seat of my bike, a car stopped in front of me and the driver pointed out that every time I put my hand out to show that I was turning right, Cheryl was putting hers out to turn left and vice versa!

I thoroughly enjoyed my years at Clarendon House. My favourite lessons were maths and the sciences but gym and games outshone them all.  I had a lot of ballet dancing classes until I was aged 12. I had to give them up then as I had too much homework to do and so not enough time. My parents did send me to piano lessons for a few years but I am not musical and it was really a waste of time and their hard earned money.

At 15 I took O Levels and passed Chemistry with Physics, Maths, English Lit, History and Geography failing French, German and English language. (Languages do not seem to be a thing we Mocketts enjoyed as Hugh failed French and English Language and Richard failed English language too).  As I was staying on for the 6 form to do Chemistry, Physics and Maths at A Level, I resat English Language and French and had to do Chemistry and Physics separately.

We had very small classes in the sciences with only two of us doing Chemistry which was scary as our teacher, Mrs Harvey,  was so strict. She also happened to be my form mistress. Most six formers took the arts so there were only about 7 of us in the science form. Only two of us did Chemistry A Level with her and five took Maths

When I was 16 we moved from Chaucer Road to the flat above Blackburns. This seemed so spacious to us.We had a large lounge overlooking York Street with a kitchen and dining room on the same floor. There were three bedrooms and a bathroom with a toilet halfway up the stairs. Hugh and Richard shared the bedroom at the front and my parents one at the back while Cheryl and I had a large bedroom with a doorway onto the roof garden. This had one wall of fitted cupboards which was such a luxury. My parents left most of the furniture behind at Chaucer Road, which they had bought by then, in order to do holiday rentals with it. They bought a lot of new furniture and I remember my mother being so upset when her new bed arrived and it was black with stars on it. Being a funeral director black was almost banned from the house! We did not have a lounge suite for some weeks and had to sit on the floor to watch TV.

My father was made Church Warden at Holy Trinity, and Hugh became head choir boy while Richard was head soloist. This meant that every Sunday, we went to church for the 10am service. No coffee was ever served in those days so  a lot of us would go down to the Tartar Frigate for a drink afterwards, including the vicar. Being in the choir meant midnight Mass at Christmas and all the choir and friends invariably came back to us for a drink and sausage and onion pie and mince pies afterwards with David Raven playing the piano. They were great times. My brothers sang in the choir for the Carol Service run by Edward Heath and Richard sang the solo as a boy for Once in Royal Davids City and later Hugh sang the solo of the Boars Head. Edward Heath always wrote a letter to thank them which had the House of Parliament notepaper as Heath was Lord Privy Seal at the time.

The holiday rental went well for my parents and was the start of them making some money. A few years later they purchased a second property in Chaucer Road to rent out.  I cannot remember the exact years but they then sold these two houses and purchased 14 Belmont Road which was three flats and also one off Chandos Square which was also in flats and at one stage had a house in Belvedere road too. Saturdays in the summer months was a busy day for us all as we had to clean the properties out for the next tenants.

In summer months I worked in Gays Cafe doing washing up to earn some pocket money and then during the summer that I left school, I worked in the cafe on the end of Broadstairs jetty. I enjoyed that and could watch my family when they were at the beach hut. I started going out that summer with someone called Michael Baker. He was a university student doing a summer job delivering  Walls ice cream. That ended when college started. The day that I heard that I had the necessary A levels to go to Queen Elizabeth College, London University, I was so excited that when I arrived at work that morning, I did not turn on the gas as I usually did. Someone had not turned it off correctly the night before. The gas was supplied by cylinders and they had turned it off there but not at the heater. When the elderly woman went to light the heater, it exploded in her face. She lost all her eyebrows and the front of her hair and was taken to hospital by ambulance. Someone turned it off again at the mains after this happened and the boss lit it a while later and the same thing happened to him. I have never liked using gas cookers since.

I started at college in October 1959. My parents drove me up to London. It was in Camden Hill Road, off Kensington High Street. It was later closed and became part of Kings College.

As we drove up to the gate a beautiful Indian girl in a sari was coming out and I remember my mother commenting on how beautiful she was. You have to remember that in those days one never saw anyone like that in Broadstairs. There were very very few people in the country from abroad in those days.

I was put to share a room with Joy Newsam from Barbados and we soon became great friends and included in our group were Chitra Boghilal (the Indian girl from Mumbai), Hugi Torzs who had come to England in the Hungarian revolution having had the most incredible escape and having to lie in the luggage rack of a train. The fifth member was Jenna McGuire of Australian origin. I thoroughly enjoyed my year at the college but the study was a different matter. Where school had finished and college started were several years apart. If I had been doing the arts I think that would not have mattered so much but in the science it was impossible to make up  and to understand what they were doing and I had only studied pure maths and not applied maths which would have helped.  I failed the exams and so had to leave as did Joy and Jenna. In fact nobody doing maths qualified as they either failed in the first year or the third. Whilst I was there I started going out with someone from Imperial College called Dick Slingsby from Yorkshire. He was a friend of Jenna’s. He and his mother took a house in Newton Ferrers near Plymouth and I took Cheryl with me to stay with them for a week in the summer holidays. I never saw him again after that but oddly found him on Facebook and contacted him to see if he had any news of Jenna.  Sadly he had not and so none of us have any knowledge of her after leaving college. Joy, Chitra and I have always kept in contact since then and we saw Hugi occasionally until the 70s. I met her in Montreal where she was working but sadly cannot find out any more about her.

I was invited to a cocktail party given by John Martin of WW Martins the builders, at his home in Park Road and held before the squash club dinner dance to which I was not invited. At this cocktail party I met my old chemistry mistress – Mrs Harvey – who invited me back to her house opposite St Andrew’s church for some supper. While there I rather think she was trying to get me interested in her son and also told me the history of the house. Apparently it used to be the old vicarage and the vicar had been the leader of the smugglers. She lifted up the carpet in her dining room to show me the entry to the tunnel which the smugglers used and which went down to Joss Bay.

After leaving college, I then went to work at Smith Kline and French in Welwyn Garden City in 1960. My Uncle John and Aunty Chick lived there ( both my uncle and cousin Philip worked at SK&F (now Glaxo Smith Kline) so I lodged with them. I hated it there. My aunt was so different to my mother. The house was dirty and my belongings were not safe. She would use whatever of them she wanted to. Looking back, I feel sorry for her as she was kept short of money and had a hard life.  I enjoyed the work which was in the chemistry laboratories making new compounds to try out as medicines but I left there after a year and returned to Broadstairs as I was not very happy at their home and did not particularly like Welwyn as I missed the sea

I went for about 20 interviews for work. I was lucky enough to be offered every single job that I applied for. However, I accepted the offer from Shell Research at Tunstall just outside Sittingbourne in 1961 and worked there until 1965. This was in the chemistry laboratory where we worked on insecticides and fertilizers. It was most interesting and I was doing a lot of gas liquid chromatography and thin layer chromatography. There were 8 men in the lab and I was the only girl. Prince Philip visited us as our lab was so new. At first I traveled to Sittingbourne each day by train and then later by car owned by a man who also worked there and lived in Ramsgate. The Thanet Way in those days was three lanes and 13 roundabouts and was lethal to drive. Our driver was someone who did not like sitting behind another car and we were involved in about 3 accidents and saw many more. I think this is the reason I have always been a backseat passenger in a car.

In October 1962, I went to a cocktail party with John Martin at his house in Fig Tree road before going on to the squash club dinner dance with him. As we drove into his driveway he said that the Bennetts had arrived. I assumed that they were a married couple. I chatted for a long time with a man who said he loved ballroom dancing and we should have a dance later. He did not ask me to dance that evening. A few weeks later, Joy and I went to the Winter Gardens to a classical concert. We were waiting on the steps for my father who had gone to park the car. The same man came up the stairs and stopped to speak to us. It was the chap I had met at John Martin’s cocktail party but I could not remember his name.

The next day, at work at Shell, I had a phone call from this same man who said he was Nicholas Bennett and he had phoned round friends to find out my contact details and would like to take me out to dinner. I said yes but after putting the phone down I thought he must be married as John had said the Bennetts had arrived. I then had to  phone round  friends and found that it was his sister that John had been referring to.

Nicholas took me to dinner at the Falstaff in Canterbury before stopping at Sarre Court on the way home. I remember being nervous and had ordered a Dover sole which missed the plate and landed on the table as I tried to turn it over. We had a wobbly table so Nicholas wedged the leg with his diary which he forgot to take back and so for the rest of the winter could not be sure which girl he had invited to which dance!

We hit it off immediately. I remember being overawed by his busy social life. He had qualified as a solicitor – the youngest in the country at the time – and was working at Boys and Maughan in Margate where he had been articled to Garth Roadknight. The senior partner was Jack Maughan who only  had one eye having lost it when hit by a golf or cricket ball and who wore a black patch over it.

On February 14th 1963 we became engaged and announced it at the squash club dinner dance. In March of that year we went skiing to Serfaus in Austria. My first time on the slopes.  However on September 4th that year Nicholas broke off our engagement. It appeared that he was taking out his secretary called Gillian. His parents did not approve as her father was in gaol.  I was devastated but looking back it was a good thing to have happened as I think both of us were too young  and  immature and as a result I went flying with BOAC and Nicholas became a partner and did some traveling and so when we did marry I am sure things were much more successful.

With the money that I had saved up towards us getting married I bought an old car. A Hillman Imp registration LXM765 which cost me the great sum of £30. I also bought myself a Singer sewing machine which lasted me many years. I had to have lessons to learn to drive and was so lucky in that my father was very patient with me and took me out. I do remember him giving me a lesson in clutch control along the Western Esplanade. I managed to do this successfully and  he then stood in front of the car and told me to edge the car up to touch his trousers. I did this perfectly but unfortunately as he came back  to sit on the passenger seat, I let my foot off the clutch and sent him flying onto the grass!

I passed my driving test at the first attempt on Joy’s birthday -22nd December 1963- and then decided to drive to work at Sittingbourne. The car was old – no MOT in those days- and filled with smoke from a leaking gasket and every time I went round a roundabout (there were 13 on the Thanet Way in those days) it shot out of gear and into neutral. As I turned off the Thanet Way and went round the roundabout that joins to the M2, a police car started up  and flagged me down into a lay by. Two young officers got out and asked who owned the car and what was the registration of it. I said LXM 765 whereupon I was asked where the X was off the rear number plate. I did not like to say it had fallen off a few weeks before and that `Hugh had been stopped about it, so said it had fallen off a few days before and I had not had a chance to have it put back. I then said that I hoped it was not my driving as I had only passed my test a couple of hours before. They were both laughing so hard that one had to sit on the bonnet of my car and then they drove off wishing me Happy Christmas and safe driving.

I was sad to hear from my friend Joy in  late 1964 or early 1965 that she was going to move to California. After she had left college, she had studied radiotherapy and her boss at the Middlesex hospital was moving to Palo Alto and asked her to go with him. I decided that I would like to go too but in those days with no internet, it was impossible for me to find work so Joy suggested that I do the same job as her flat mate who was an air stewardess. I didn’t think I had an earthly chance of getting in particularly as they liked you to have catering, languages or nursing – none of my accomplishments. Joy bet me 5/- that I would get in (25p in today’s money).

I did not even know that there were two airports in London and simply wrote to the Personnel officer of BOAC, BEA and PanAm at London Airport. Amazingly I heard back from them all. I decided that I would not go with PanAm as it meant living in the US, or BEA as that was just Europe so applied to BOAC.

We had to send off a full length photo of ourselves with the application form. Mine was taken when I had a lovely black eye which showed up in the photo. I went for an interview and came home disheartened and feeling sure that I would not be offered a job as the whole interview lasted about 10 minutes. (All the way from Broadstairs to Heathrow for 10 minutes! ). It would appear that they needed to look at you and to see how you walked in.  I was at work at Shell some time later when my mother rang me to say that I had another interview with them. This one was so different. It lasted most of the afternoon and we went in to see each of three different people. They were obviously trying to upset you and see if you would stay calm as one chap basically wanted to know if I would be sleeping with  members of the crew. There were about 20 of us at that afternoon and they brought in a tea trolley for us. I helped to pour out the tea and always have felt that this helped me to get the job. They said at the end of the afternoon that about 6 of us had not completed all our forms and would we stay behind and that they would be letting us know their decisions by post. It was those 6 who were offered the job. I was so stunned that as I returned to Joy’s flat in South Kensington I tried unlocking the wrong front door and broke the key in the lock! It was the night before she left to go to Palo Alto and her brother in law took us out to dinner. When we returned later that evening it was to find that she had been burgled. I then had to go back to Heathrow for a very careful medical.  This must have been in Spring of 1965 and I left Shell in the July before going camping to Brittany with Jenny Kortwright – a flat mate of Joy’s.

We went to Brittany taking rucksacks, a small tent that we could just both lie down in and sit up in and when we first put it up it was to find it had some large  holes. It rained often while we were there – near Carnac- so we made friends with two French lads who had a larger tent. They were useful as we could sit in their tent out of the rain and one played the guitar. I do remember him playing Smoke Gets In Your Eyes

We left Brittany after about 3 weeks camping there and went to Sark where we worked in the hotel. Jenny had worked there the previous year and so knew her way around. She cleaned rooms and I worked in the kitchen. I think that the chef felt I was undernourished being so thin and often gave me desserts and tasty food.  We flew back to Southampton and my father drove me home to Broadstairs.  Later that year on 15th November 1965 I started my training with BOAC

They had organized accommodation for me in Staines so I had to commute into the training center by bus. We had six weeks of training. I remember walking in to the classroom on the Monday morning and wondering what on earth I was doing there. The instructress, Maggie Allen now Deacock, was stunning. Tall, blond and with her hair in a perfect French pleat. The other 18 girls were all gorgeous too. I felt a country bumpkin.  I really did not know why I was there and how I had been accepted.

On the first Monday morning, as soon as we arrived, we had to go for jabs. It was like being in the army as we had three – smallpox, yellow fever and cholera. By evening my arm was so painful and I had swollen glands all over my body and felt really poorly. I went to bed early that night and somehow managed to get to the training school on time the next morning. The girls were all comparing sore arms but when they saw mine which was red and swollen from shoulder to elbow they stopped. I still felt unwell three weeks later when we had to line up for the next three jabs – cholera, TABT and yellow fever.

We were taught so much in those six weeks. We had lessons on silver service, wines and how to tell what the wine was from the shape of the bottle, what food to serve with what, make up from Elizabeth Arden, air sea rescue when we had to go to a local pool and inflate a life raft. Even on the flat water of the pool we were feeling sick so I am glad we never had to use one.

We went to the fire service and were taught how to extinguish the different fires. They had a building with 2 doors only and a wall up the middle almost to the far end and a smoking fire in it so the place was full of smoke. We were all dressed in boiler suits, wellingtons and headscarves and were made to crawl along the floor with our nose to the ground and out the other door. The girl in front of me lost her Wellington boot half way round and spent ages looking for it. I nearly panicked! It was all good experience for us.

We also had to watch a colored film on how to deliver a baby. A class of stewards had joined us and at the end of the film there were no stewards left as they had either passed out or gone out and before the lights went on one girl said “No sex for me this weekend!”.  You have to remember that in those days we did not have colored television so it was a bit of a shock.

How lucky I was to have this job. It was in the days before  package holidays, teletext or internet and none of my friends had flown across the Atlantic. Some maybe to France or Spain. My supernumerary was only the third time I had flown as the first was to Italy when I was twelve and the second back from Guernsey just before I started with BOAC.

My first flight – my supernumerary- was on January 6th 1966 and also was the day that my parents moved from the flat at Blackburns into 92 Pierremont Avenue.  I flew to Montreal and Toronto for about 3 days. I was so excited to be in Canada that I woke early the next morning and no crew were awake so I went out to look round Montreal. Stupidly I had not taken note of the hotel I was staying in and so when I went to go back to get ready for my next pickup, I was lost. It was so cold there ad -10C – and I only had nylons, high heeled shoes and a lightweight winter coat so was freezing. I asked a taxi driver if he knew where BOAC stewardesses stayed and his shocked reply was ” why are you one?”. He mentioned the Montreal hotel which rang a bell so I headed there and was told by the bellhop that it was the Laurentian so I had another walk back. By the time I got to my room I was almost crying with the pain of thawing out. After that I always took a box of book matches from the hotel with me.

Being an air stewardess was a wonderful job to have in those days. We were well paid and meant to be the cream of the girls. It was a very difficult job to get into and the average life of a stewardess was 18 months as we had to leave at the age of 31, or after 10 years or if we married. If I am honest, suddenly the men were all much more interested in me. I was invited to the wedding of Gill Sykes to Nigel Gore on 30th July 1966 at Our Lady Star of the Sea. It was the day of the final of the World Cup football and there were no men in the reception as they had all gone in to watch the TV!  It was that day when I had several men all wanting to chat to me and Nicholas was there with his girlfriend – Gillian. At that wedding I was asked out by David Gore and so went out occasionally with him at the same time as I was seeing his cousin Chris Gore. David after a few months left England with friends to drive to South Africa and I never saw him again but I saw Chris for some months.

I had a couple of worrying times on flights. One with my parents which I am writing about below but between my second and third flights, BOAC lost an aircraft at Tokyo. It was the first crash in 20 years. On my next flight which was to be a three week trip going from London to Manchester, New York, Nassau shuttle and then the Caribbean, we had a problem leaving New York. It was a Saturday and the plane was full of American honeymooners. Something had gone wrong on the ground and the couples were not all sat together which caused us a great deal of trouble trying to seat them all. Shortly after takeoff, as we started to get the meal service ready, the senior steward came to tell us to lock everything down carefully as we were going back into New York. I asked why and he said it was because we had an engine on fire and then proceeded to look out the window to see if he could see it.  We had an emergency landing back in New York. The airport had been closed due to the rain and bad weather but opened for us and we landed safely with fire engines racing alongside us. After we had all disembarked, the crew were told that we could not do the shuttle due to time so to collect our suitcases from the hold. That was when we could see that the engine was completely burnt out and out of 60 fire warnings on 707s only 2 had been real fires and ours was the third.

I was lucky to be posted to Boeing 707s as BOAC had also VC10s. The VC10s went to Africa and to North and South America but 707s went all round the world. I was lucky enough to be in Teheran for the day of the Coronation of the Shah on October 26th 1967 and could walk down the road from my hotel and see the procession go past. They took a lot of guests in our London double decker buses.

I also went to Israel and as the aircraft broke down we had about 4 days there so was able to do some tours of the country. I was also on the last flight out of Israel before the 6 day war broke out in June 1967 and when touring Jerusalem I went to the site where they believe the Last Supper was held. There was a minaret outside the window with sandbags and machine guns and the walls of the room I was in had bullet holes in the walls.

My class has met up regularly each year for lunch and when it was our 50 year reunion BA invited us there and this was what they posted in the telegraph https://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/news/Being-an-air-hostess-during-the-golden-age-of-flying/

I was quoted the following in the article:

“Her former colleague Judith Mockett added: “On one flight, I somehow managed to set fire to a passenger. As I went up the aisle I inadvertently knocked an Australian gentleman’s arm just as he was putting his cigarette to his mouth. The ash fell on his nylon shirt and set fire to it immediately – I hadn’t even noticed. By the time I came back down the aisle, he and his pal were laughing hard and told me what had happened.

“I offered to get some burn cream for him and he said that if I put it on for him, he would not send in a complaint. Such flirtation by passengers towards the air stewardesses was a very common occurrence and something we all became deft at dealing with!”

Not long after Nigel and Jill Gores wedding  I was at the squash club and so was Nicholas and he asked me to go out with him again. I said no as he was still with the girl he dropped  me for and I was not going to do to her what she had done to me. He asked me out a lot of times and always had the same answer. Eventually, he had broken things off with her and I agreed to meet him in London – not in Thanet as too many people knew us. After about a year, we did become engaged again having gone to the same shop in Bond Street to buy the second engagement ring where we not only bought the first one but I had sold it. I always said that I had sold it and gone skiing on the proceeds. (I had given the ring back when Nicholas broke off the engagement but he returned it to my mother who kept it for some months. As I was going to London to stay with Joy she told me and so I took it with me and returned to the shop in Bond Street. I was so upset that as I left the shop I nearly walked in front of a bus by accident. It was the same day that Joy, Jenny and I booked to go skiing hence the story about it paying for a skiing holiday.)

When flying one could take one family member a year away paying 10% of the air fares so I waited 2 years and then took my parents to San Francisco to stay with Joy for a few days, back to New York to stay with Dad’s brother Al.  I left them there and returned home. They were then going to Bermuda and then to Barbados.  The three fares cost me £90. It was the first time that they had ever been on  a plane and both were so excited. When we were at Heathrow, I met Ros Sharp who trained with me. She told us how they had been on FH (each aircraft has its own number) into Trinidad when the undercarriage would not come down for landing properly and ended up having to circle the runway with someone standing with binoculars to see if it was down. Not something my parents were too keen to hear. As we boarded our aircraft for New York, I saw that it was FH – the same one. They enjoyed the flight and just about to go in to land at New York, I explained that they should take no notice of the loud noise as it was the undercarriage coming down. They were quite happy but I was as white as a sheet as I knew that it had gone up and down about 5 times. It appeared that a light in the cockpit was not coming on to say it was in position.

I left them in New York for a few more days with my Uncle and flew home to find that I was rostered to go to Bermuda, Barbados, and Bogota on my next trip arriving in Bermuda the same day that they arrived to stay at the Inverurie Hotel where I was. I then actually flew them to Barbados. As the plane was full, I was unable to upgrade them to first class but did provide them with free drinks and I rather think that my father flowed down the aircraft steps in Barbados.

I carried onto Trinidad and Bogota and on the return flight as we got to Barbados for a short stop, our aircraft broke down so the crew had to stay the night in Barbados  and were put up at the Hilton. My poor parents had gone away on a second honeymoon to have their daughter following them around all the time.

I was sad to leave flying but in those days one had to leave if you got married and it would have been difficult to run a home and commute to Heathrow and being away for anything from 3 days to 3 weeks. Looking back now after nearly 60 years, I wish I had decided to fly for a couple more years before marrying Nicholas but I was nearly 27 when we married and in those days it was considered old to get married. How times have changed.  When away once on holiday, we were asked which were the best five years of our lives and it was an easy decision for me. 1965 to 1970 as it include flying, marrying and having a baby.

On March 23rd 1968 Nicholas and I were married at Holy Trinity Church, Broadstairs with about 120 guests, Our reception was at the Walpole Bay Hotel in Cliftonville where we had a buffet meal. In those days we did not stay on for an evening event so Nicholas and I caught the train to London where we spent the first night at a hotel at Heathrow. The next day we flew to Bermuda for 4 days staying at the Inverurie and then flew to Barbados where we had 2 weeks at Paradise Beach Club. Joy’s father knew the manager and so arranged for a suite of rooms for us. It was Paradise!!!

We then flew to New York as Nicholas had never been there and I wanted to buy my  Paul Revere copper bottomed saucepans. Then back to our home in Northdown Park Road. It was a shock to me to  have a regular day and night after flying for nearly 3 years. Also it took some adjustment to be reliant on someone else for money after earning a good wage myself. I had £6 a week to feed us both on and to pay the milk bill. Hard to imagine nowadays but a beef joint would not cost more than 15/- or 75p then. Andrew was born while we were living there and we moved to West Dumpton Lane in the January when he was 9 months old.

This was a lovely house but in the wrong position as we had Prestige Avenue at the end of the road and it turned out to be where they housed ex convicts. We were burgled 3 times in that house in 3 years. Helen was born whilst we were living there and the car was broken into and several baby gifts stolen from the car. She was born when the coal miners were on strike and the country were having 3 power cuts a day lasting for 3 hours. It was not a good start when you have a premature baby in the house.

I had postnatal depression after she was born which lasted for 4 years and was not helped by the fact that Helen did not sleep well. Thanks to my lovely mother and an understanding doctor we survived it but I would not wish that on anyone.

We decided we would like to buy a four bedroom house with two bathrooms. We kept an eye on the market for about 18 months and went to see North Goodwin House one Saturday afternoon. I fell in love with it immediately but it was soooooo expensive. She was asking £38000! The next day we went to Cranbrook as the Round Table were playing cricket there. I kept saying what I would do with the house if it were mine. As we got into bed that night, Nicholas told me that he had rung the lady and agreed to pay her asking price for NGH. Wow. I am not sure if I was more cross he made me wait so long to tell me or more thrilled!

We moved to North Goodwin House on August 12th 1974. Helen and Andrew spent the first night with Anma and Granga and boy was I glad as I have never been so exhausted as I was that night. You all know what a lovely house it was but when we moved in the kitchen was a nightmare. All the wall backing onto the playroom was floor to ceiling cupboards with bright red doors and the wallpaper had large bunches of plums – one red, one yellow and one purple- and it was hung upside down. There was a cooker hood over an old cooker which was so low poor Nicholas banged his head on it all the time. We had it refitted as soon as we could possibly afford to.

Luckily Giles was born 2 years after moving into the house. What luck it was as it really made us a family and he was a very easy baby and I had no post natal depression

I think you know the rest of the story.

Continue reading Memories of my life

I have collected photos of old Broadstairs, some from old postcards and some from a site on Facebook.  I thought it might be of interest to make a post about it.

  This photo of Holy Trinity church, where my parents and Nicholas and I were married, is pre 1920 and before the tower was removed because it was dangerous. So many changes as there are no trees there nowadays.

This shows the inside of the church before the trellising  was moved to the side chapel

5th May 1929

Included with the above letter were some newspaper cuttings about the school and also the Pettits college details. This is obviously how Norman was learning his typing and shorthand

27th July 1932

23rd June 1933

I have typed this letter out as Norman had handwritten it while lying in bed.

Elmbank
Park Lane
Deal

23/6/33

Dear Alf
Let’s hope this letter finds you in a better position than I am at present for I am writing in bed and I suppose you know how hard it is to do that the Doctor says I have had haemorrhage of the brain but I don’t believe him nor does mother. This is what happened:- On Whit Monday I went sailing and rowing which I will tell you about later and went back to work for the rest of the week. On Sat following I had a headache but I carried on as usual. All Sat, Sunday it lasted so on the Monday I went to the Doctors it still aching then. The doctor said that I had a touch of sunstroke. He gave me some medicine but as it was still aching in the evening (Monday) I went to see hm again and this time he gave me some tablets.

On waking up on the Tuesday, my head was aching worse than ever, but mind you I was still walking about and during the morning it got on my nerves that I told Mum to fetch the Doctor so I went to bed (about 2.15pm) and the Doctor came during the afternoon. He gave me an injection then another in the evening and one next morning (Wed) and a fourth that evening. He told mother that I had got a haemorrhage on the brain and was a serious case. Mother however did not believe him but of course she did not say so

Now do you think I could have walked about nearly 4 days with a broken blood vessel in my head because I don’t. Also, Alf, according to 3 or 4 people who know a bit about such things I would of had a fit in the first place taking two or three men to hold me down & if I survived that I would have been paralysed down one side and funny enough I had read about this before the people told Mum.

What I have really have is a touch of sunstroke, over exertion and inflammation of the brain but I am ok now so that is alright.

Well Alf, I have also taken to the sea, only in a sense of pleasure, Here is a short account of the mad tricks we get up to:- the crew comprising a Deal lad named Bert Fielder, now working in London, Ted Goodburn and myself, The boat we use is a galley, 25 years old, 29 ft 6 in long 6-7 cwt of ballast , common big sail. Easter Friday we sailed down the coast to Sandwich Bay where those nasty rollers which you no doubt remember in the bay broke over our gunwale and swamped us. From there we headed E a round 5 miles to the Brake Lightship which we boarded as usual. On the Sat we sailed again to Sandwich or Pegwell Bay then rowed 16 miles up the river Stour past Sandwich and “The Mystery Port”. We spent then night in the boat trying to sleep on the oars placed along the seats. Gee it was cold and at day-break we re-rowed the 16 miles to the mouth of the Stour and then sailed home.
We are the first to sail a galley into Ramsgate Harbour for about 15 years, The very first to take a galley up the Stour and on Whit Sunday we rowed from Deal to Ramsgate, sailed for 10 minutes past Ramsgate having encountered a little breeze & then rowed to Broadstairs. From Broadstairs we sailed to the Brake Lightship then on to the South Goodwin Lightship and then into Dover Harbour where we had tea. We sailed from the entrance of the harbour to nearly St Margarets Bay (ratching by the way) where the wind dropped and we had to row home, In that day we covered nearly 50 miles out of which we rowed for about 20 miles

I am getting on fine at my work and since I have been ill the boss (Mr Daniels) has told Wilf that he misses me a lot and that I am the best hand he has had for a long time. The manager has also praised me up to some people who are friends of mine so that is alright.

On the 9th May Frank had a little girl (Audrie Florence Mockett) note:- A.F.M mothers initials. He was down here last week end to see me and is still out of work.

I hope you are getting on with your work alright and are interested for that I do know is half the battle.
Well, Alf, there is a lot I would like to tell you about but I do not know where to start and I cannot scribble much more to you long here in bed. I get stiff all over
Everybody OK here
Cheerio Alf
From your loving Brother
Norman

You should now read the letter from Florence, dated August 1933, as it goes on to explain just how ill Norman had been. The Doctor gave him just 48 hours to live!

9th NOVEMBER 1933

1st February 1934

8th february 1933 – Norman’s 21st birthday

                                  8th February 1934 Page 2

1942 – when in the dessert.

A card sent to Alfred by Teddy in 1948

 April 23RD 1952

I do remember the lovely days we used to have in Willow Woods and all the flowers we picked. I also very clearly remember hearing the results of my 11+. We were told in the assembly and I was allowed to run home to tell my mother . We lived very close to St Mildred’s School, so it would only have taken me about ten minutes to do that but I also wanted to tell my father who was at work in Blackburns, so I ran all the way down there to do so. By the time I got back to school, I was in trouble for being so long!

I thought you might like to see a photo of our old dog, Kiwi.

My cousin, Kathie, is kindly sending me copies of all the letters that her father, Alfred, received in the USA. He went there in 1928, when he jumped ship, and kept letters from his mother and others. These letters  are making such interesting reading for us all. I am going to post the letters and also to type them out as Florence wrote them. Florence obviously had little in the way of education, almost certainly leaving school at the age of 10. As a result she uses no punctuation at all and I have found some letters difficult to read.   I am typing in red the words I cannot be sure of. The letters give us so much information about the Depression and our family life in the 1930’s, that I am fascinated by them. I am posting copies of some of the original letters for you to see but  then,  later, I  will just post my typed copy of them.

The thing that comes across very strongly is the love that Florence has for her sons.  I think it also comes across, how very close she was to both Alfred and Norman.

June 10th 1928

This is how I have managed to type up the above letter

Sunny Bank
Albert Road
Deal

June 10th 1928

My dear Alf
I wrote to you on 25th or 26th of May. You was just about leaving Baltimore as I was writing, it coming day after I received your letter. I was going to write, but Les was ill and Frank was at home until the 22nd so I had plenty to do. In my letter I told you Les and Lydia were being married the 28th May. Well it came off all right and a very nice wedding they had. When the vicar found Les & you were brothers and you had been in the choir he got all the choir boys together he could and gave them a full service & a very nice address after. The church was full. They had the Masonic Hall and over sixty sat down to supper and a dance after they received just on 80 presents. I have already sent you one paper Baltimore but I manage to get another one for fear you don’t get that one.I was glad you only one week out of work because that takes all the gilt off your savings. Get so much out of work but I new you would try and get a job. Fancy coming to Manchester. I am afraid you will have it pretty rough because it blowing pretty hard here and I see by the papers some of the big liners are held up. I hope you get the chance to cum home but as you say it a lot of money if you only home a few hour. I know you will do what you think best. Frank got his job again in the Blue Line. The name of his ship is Avila. He goes to B A (Buenos Aires) just about the same as the (I can’t read name but looks like) Kowloon boats did. Tom Tillie has a job in New York for two years. I have enclosed some snaps that were taken on the wedding day – they are not too bad but the sun was so strong then we are all drawing a face. Well dear I must close wishing you a safe journey. With heaps and heaps of love & the very best wishes from your loving Mother

I have punctuated this letter but not corrected all her spelling.

Elmbank
Park Lane
Deal

June 30th 1931

My dear Alf

Received your most welcome letter yesterday. Glad you where about to leave New York. By the papers they have had a heat wave 75 died. We have very nice weather – not to hot. Frank was here two weeks ago,. He has to stand off three & four days a week. Such few boats in. He is having rather a hard time of it. Dad as finished right up everything. Les has the luck to get back to that other chap – thats a lot off my mind to have heard,
Its very hard for for me with no one to give cleaning done waiting for the visitors to come. I dont think Deal is going to have much of a season. Every one short of money. When you get the papers you will see we have had a murder in Deal. I am glad the poor chap got off. Dad knows him. He had enough to make him do it long ago. Normans getting on fine. Likes his work ever so much. You will see in the papers where he has a sale on today in (I simply cannot read the next few words which look like Hawkhurst hospital. Beach Street.)
the sale is at the Auction Mart Park St. He left home this morning at 8 it as just gone 4 as not been home for his dinner.
When there is a sale on that is the hardest part, He never knows when it will end. They have 272 lots to get ride of today. The in closed came here for you the other day. When I saw it was address to Sunny Bank I new it was some one that did not know much about you so I opened it, found it was some one you came knowing going to be married, I hope you get it in time to answer it. When you do they will know it had to come all the way to to NewYork. Well dear I must close now or I shall miss the mail. with all the best god could give you.
From your loving mother

Park Lane is now called Beechwood Avenue

The enclosed was this invite:

June 28th 1932

                        Elmbank
Park Lane
Deal

June 28th 1932

My dear Alf
I was just pleased to get your letter as I was to your last. I have been wondering what you were doing. You said you might be out of a job and I was waiting to here from you and what address to write to. I am glad you have got in another job and like it so much. What a lot better for you. You will get on I fell sure. It won’t be for want of trying – that I do know. Norman’s getting on well – every week he comes home we are please with him ??? I am wondering what he will say when I give him your letter this week end to ???? the week you sent Frank the £2 he came to Deal and brought his eldest boy with him I would of kept the poor little lad but to was too much for me to. He was okay here six days. Frank took him back home on the Friday come back again Monday as he had the promise of a job Monday morning but nothing came of it. I kept him here about ten days and give him a good feed up every day. He went and had a hunt around but nothink doing. He went back home is wife wrote and said she only had a few little jobs which he does his self. He ?????? is only a one man firm now. Still we have a lot to be thankful for – a good many people in Deal would be able to let there rooms. Les keeps in work but says they are on the finish if nothink more comes along it is all over. The world alike I don’t expect you got your place if you had not been able to pay that hundred pounds. That was a lot of money for you to pay and now have yourself to keep. I must close now. wishing you the best of luck and heaps of love
From your loving Mother

 2nd September 1932

Elmbank
Park Lane
Deal

2nd Sept 1932

My dear Alf
I think its nearly time you had a few lines from me. I find quite enough to do. Get rather tired and the heat took it out of my. My word it was hot last month. It as broken up now, turned cold and wet. I suppose we shall grumble about that soon. There is not much news. Dad is very well, as a few small jobs come in. Norman starts is weeks holiday from tomorrow, Saturday. Les has had to stand off three days this week as —— again now. I do hope is boss finds enough to keep him going this winter but everything is still very bad over here by the papers. Now Frank is about the same. I am glad you are getting on so well. I fell (felt) more than please about it. Hope you have not had it to hot. It makes one fell right down ill several nights. We were 93 – thats high for here. Frank came home about 3 weeks ago for Dad to set him up with brush as he had got a painter job from June. Dad set him up with what he wanted. I bought him aprons and gave him money thinking he had got a start at last. Monday we heard from him saying that job only lasted three days. He had gone back on 25/- per week as he as nun (none) is dole out that is all they give him now and that he was in trouble about is rent. I sent him £2 at once. I tell him to look for a job & go to sea again if he can. Never mind what he wants. We know very well he can’t get enough food on that money. He would have his food and she would have as much money without him to keep. I don’t know what next we shall have here but don’t you trouble. You have got yourself to look after – that’s why I don’t like telling you all in case.
With best love and wishes from your ever loving mother

dated october 20th 1932

Elmbank
Park Lane
Deal

Oct 20th 1932

My dear Alf

Just a few lines hoping your cold is better. We have all had colds, nearly everyone we know has been laid up with them. Everything is very quiet. Les has only been working two or three days a week and poor old Frank is still out . Have just heard from him this morning. Dad as sold nearly all his working tools just kept few to do any little jobs that come along. What was the use of him paying 6/ 6d a week for is big store and no work and another thing he only wants light work how he was 65 in August. He says he is getting past it. He don’t want roof work just what he can do on the ground and it was no good keeping it on for Les. Some big builders are glad to take little jobs that Dad use to have. Norman will soon be earning more money. We can just manage but one never knows there luck. Old Chapman as just died being buried today. He may left us a 100 or two. I don’t think you will read all about it in the papers. The little snap is of me and my dog taken on the lawn I was washing up when the lady staying with us said “come on I have just one left” but they say if I had guess from it I should not looked so well. I am sending this one she is going to get half dozen more done for me. By the papers there as been rioting in Glasgow and London with the unemployed. We shall have one in Deal if things don’t buck up. Everything seems died no chance of letting your rooms. My people left on the 21st September and I think I was nearly the last one in Deal to have a empty house. Well dear I hope everythink has gone well with you. So far have you been to see the Slavan yet? I should hold in with him. With heaps of love from your loving mother
xxxxx
xxxxx

 9th november 1932

I have added a letter that Norman wrote to Alfred, talking about joining Alfred in America so I will not re-post it here but here is a link to the page

https://www.judithbennett.co.uk/norman/

He was obviously enjoying working at Daniels and doing well judging by the complementary letter that he received.

Elmbank
Park Lane
Deal

Dec 7th 1932

My Dear Alf
Just a few lines to wish you a happy Christmas. I shall be think of you wondering where you are and what you are doing. I have sent you three pairs of socks I have made my self this year. Hope you can wear them and like the colour. You wear such gay colours out there if you send some colours you would like I can make you some more. I must have something to do. Have been making Dad, Norman and Frank a long time, They would cost to buy ready made here about 4/6. I can make them for just under 2/- per pair. Not every one can wear home made socks. Wilf is unable make is feet ache. If they the same you can find some one to give them to. So glad your eye is better . It was awful painful I know. A few years ago Frank had the same thing happen. I thought he was going mad. He came down last Saturday , brought is wife and children down to her mothers as she thought her mother would have to be in hospital for a month or two back, Beat  took her to Canterbury hospital Monday, They sent her back said they could do nothing until June.
The children and him are going to stay over Christmas. Frank is still out. I don’t know what will happen to him if he don’t soon find somethink. He looks awfull thin , nothing but skin and bone then bikes all the way from Tilbury and back just on 60 miles each way (IT IS ACTUALLY 76 MILES) . I help him all I can but with Norman to keep it makes me poor but I have got a lot to be thankful for. A good many parents have nothink them selves there is plenty here with husbands and sons out of work.
Dad still finds a few little jobs he don’t keep on all the week. He works two or three days then has a rest. I ask Norman if he had seen anythink of Miss March. He says she is going out with some chap that works in the gas works. I have been down for a lot time. It is a good walk from here. OK I have just heard from Mrs Chitty and overs (others?) saying them bakers have sent another 10/- off my account. You remember them they had own house in Blenheim Rd. they still owe me some of the rent. well I must close now. Wishing you everythink of the best health and happyness with fondest love your your ever loving Mother

                        This is a label sent with  socks for his birthday

February 3rd 1933

Elmbank
Park Avenue
Deal

Feb 3rd 1933

My Dear Alf
I expect you think it time you had a few lines from me but there not much news we have had some rather bad weather which left plenty of flu i am just getting over my share its left my back so bad thank goodness i never had such a bad time as last year when i get my back better shall be able to jab? at it I have not heard from Frank for about two weeks when he said everythink was just about the same thinks sometime he will go mad I think I told you all about her people sending for them to come down to her home at Walmer while her mother went in Canterbury hospital when her mother found she did have to stay there that was on the Tuesday as they came on the Saturday
the Monday morning before nine o’clock they were all four turned out with nothing to eat and bitter cold poor old Frank I shall never forget how upset he was what a good thing he never gave up there home I gave them all a good feed & her and the children the money to get back to Tilbury by bus Frank went on his push bike he said the same as I have there is no place like home of course that as made them bad friends now dirty dago her mother they never had sixpence between them and not a bit food what did she think the poor things were going to do
Norman as had is dose Wilf was poorly back before Christmas we received your tel Christmas morning it put the wind up us for the moment that and one or two cards was all we had there was only Norman Dad and I at home I done my weeks washing it was just the same to us everything very quiet I am glad you liked the sacks? you shall have the scarf as soon as it is done

I must close hoping you are keeping well and don’t get the flu heaps of love from your loving Mother

march 30th 1933

Elmbank
Park Lane
Deal

March 30th 1933

My dear Alf

Why dont you write. Its no good of you saying dont worry. Not hearing from you would make me more. I got your letter the day after I sent the scarf off and wrote next day. Paps think about you I put the address wrong the scarf was not what I thought it was going to turn out but thought it would do just for the cold weather. Since I sent it we have had it quite hot – by the papers you have been having it the same. Les as just started work this week after two week out. When we heard from Frank last week he thought he had a chance of a job. Thats all I have heard. Have you heard from Harolds wife. She payed one of her flying visits . Ask all about you.It was the week I got your letter saying you was out. She ask for your address to write. I don’t know how many times I have given it to her. Dad,Norman and myself are well. I have just started spring cleaning. It very hard work for me with no one to give me a hand. Everythink seems so heavy to lift – thats the matter flu takes all your strength. My hand shakes, I hardly know how to write but I felt I must because all the time I keep think of you the other two have been worrie enough.But you are so far away and I should have been and seen what you where doing before now, if you were nearer. Well dear with love in haste
From your loving Mother

April 28th 1933

Elmbank

Park Avenue

Deal

April 28th 1933

My dear Alf
You don’t know how pleased I was to get your letter, I was sure there was something wrong. I allways have a nasty worried felling (feeling) if there is anything wrong with my boys. Dad said when he read your letter “ you seem to be always right” because I kept saying I know Alf is in trouble about somethink. I am you got another job. Hope everythink goes right this time. You don’t say if you lost your £100. I suppose you did the same as we lost Normans £50. Dirty lot of take ins. Still they lie and seem to do well on other people money. Wilf came home yestday to give us a look. First since October. He was looking fine. Says he is saving every penny. He don’t even smoke. I don’t blame him as he says he never knows when he may be told he is not wanted. Its not so easy for him to get a job in his line now that everyone that can goes in for barbering. Now I have sent you on a white silk scarf. Its not much but I am sure you will like it for evening wear. I meant for you to have it for your birthday the 9th of this month (when) you was 24. I have only seen you once in eight years. An well perhaps it all for the best. I don’t know what you could have done here. Everything is still going bad. Les as had the luck to be kept on. Nearly all the other men came out again. When I heard from Frank last week, he was still out- he writes and build my hopes up he’s got a job coming off next time I hear from him still out. I am felling (feeling) much better able to get out every day. Dad keeps well. Norman as been troubled with his teeth latly. You know what that is. He is having three stopt (stopped) this week. I must close now. With heaps of love from your loving Mum

This letter is from Norman 23rd June 1933 to Alfred

Elmbank
Park Lane
Deal

23/6/33

Dear Alf
Let’s hope this letter finds you in a better position than I am at present for I am writing in bed and I suppose you know how hard it is to do that the Doctor says I have had haemorrhage of the brain but I don’t believe him nor does mother. This is what happened:- On Whit Monday I went sailing and rowing which I will tell you about later and went back to work for the rest of the week. On Sat following I had a headache but I carried on as usual. All Sat, Sunday it lasted so on the Monday I went to the Doctors it still aching then. The doctor said that I had a touch of sunstroke. He gave me some medicine but as it was still aching in the evening (Monday) I went to see hm again and this time he gave me some tablets.

On waking up on the Tuesday, my head was aching worse than ever, but mind you I was still walking about and during the morning it got on my nerves that I told Mum to fetch the Doctor so I went to bed (about 2.15pm) and the Doctor came during the afternoon. He gave me an injection then another in the evening and one next morning (Wed) and a fourth that evening. He told mother that I had got a haemorrhage on the brain and was a serious case. Mother however did not believe him but of course she did not say so

Now do you think I could have walked about nearly 4 days with a broken blood vessel in my head because I don’t. Also, Alf, according to 3 or 4 people who know a bit about such things I would of had a fit in the first place taking two or three men to hold me down & if I survived that I would have been paralysed down one side and funny enough I had read about this before the people told Mum.

What I have really have is a touch of sunstroke, over exertion and inflammation of the brain but I am ok now so that is alright.

Well Alf, I have also taken to the sea, only in a sense of pleasure, Here is a short account of the mad tricks we get up to:- the crew comprising a Deal lad named Bert Fielder, now working in London, Ted Goodburn and myself, The boat we use is a galley, 25 years old, 29 ft 6 in long 6-7 cwt of ballast , common big sail. Easter Friday we sailed down the coast to Sandwich Bay where those nasty rollers which you no doubt remember in the bay broke over our gunwale and swamped us. From there we headed E a round 5 miles to the Brake Lightship which we boarded as usual. On the Sat we sailed again to Sandwich or Pegwell Bay then rowed 16 miles up the river Stour past Sandwich and “The Mystery Port”. We spent then night in the boat trying to sleep on the oars placed along the seats. Gee it was cold and at day-break we re-rowed the 16 miles to the mouth of the Stour and then sailed home.
We are the first to sail a galley into Ramsgate Harbour for about 15 years, The very first to take a galley up the Stour and on Whit Sunday we rowed from Deal to Ramsgate, sailed for 10 minutes past Ramsgate having encountered a little breeze & then rowed to Broadstairs. From Broadstairs we sailed to the Brake Lightship then on to the South Goodwin Lightship and then into Dover Harbour where we had tea. We sailed from the entrance of the harbour to nearly St Margarets Bay (ratching by the way) where the wind dropped and we had to row home, In that day we covered nearly 50 miles out of which we rowed for about 20 miles

I am getting on fine at my work and since I have been ill the boss (Mr Daniels) has told Wilf that he misses me a lot and that I am the best hand he has had for a long time. The manager has also praised me up to some people who are friends of mine so that is alright.

On the 9th May Frank had a little girl (Audrie Florence Mockett) note:- A.F.M mothers initials. He was down here last week end to see me and is still out of work.

I hope you are getting on with your work alright and are interested for that I do know is half the battle.
Well, Alf, there is a lot I would like to tell you about but I do not know where to start and I cannot scribble much more to you long here in bed. I get stiff all over
Everybody OK here
Cheerio Alf
From your loving Brother
Norman

---

Letter dated 30th June 1933

Elmbank

Park Lane

Deal

30th June 1933

My dear Alf
The people living in Sunny Bank never got this letter up to us wensday 28th we dont understand what it all means Dad said I had best send it back to you if you want him to fill it in say what he is to put and let him have it back again Norman wrote to you last week he is still in bed hard luck for hm and us as well Dr said he will tell him what he can do on Monday he will have been in bed three weeks by then in hast for mail  from your loving mum

hope you are keeping well in still in your job let me know all the news

---

letter dated august 25 1933

Elmbank

Park Lane

Deal

August 25th 1933

My dear Alf
You dont know how pleased I was to here from you. We have been wondering how you got on with those papers I sent on to you but you dont say anythink about them. Dad or I could not understand them. I am sorry Mrs Harrison is leaving she as been like a mother to you. I received a very nice letter from her but have been very busy with people in and get so tired now. I have not really got over the shock Norman gave me yet I dont expect he told you when he wrote how ill he had been. when I sent for the Dr on the 13th of June he only gave him 48 hours to live told me to send for anyone I wish to see him .I sent for Frank, Wilf, Les. Poor old Wilf I thought he was going mad he was so upset I had to keep Norman laying on his back three week he was seven weeks all together before he could go back to Broadstairs he seems very well just now but as to wear glasses and keep him self very quiet. I had to take these people i have in because they had booked my rooms before is illness thank goodness they go the 3th of Sept then I shall be able to rest and pick my self up. I do hope you find some nice rooms and people to live with it makes all the difference if you have some where you can live happy with when you are wanting a meal – & good food. Dont work to hard & over do it you can study to much. Frank was here to week a go for me to help him get a few things. He had got about a months or two work at last – did Norman tell you they have got a baby girl the first in our family I never hear anythink from Horace or Harold just Frank when he wants anythink from???? they a time of it . Les I see nearly every day mainly we call him the little old man I should miss him. The week ends Wilf when the fit takes him he is working in Ramsgate house and can look after his self he says no girls dont trap him we have to laugh you know tough be all ——— I must close with heaps of love
PS dont keep me too long before you let me know what kind of people you are living with

---

October 17th 1933

Elmbank
Park Lane
Deal

Oct 17th 1933

My dear Alf
I hope these few lines finds you well. I have been expecting to here from you to know your new address. I take it Mrs Harrison is still in New York. My people left after all the middle of last month. Since then I have had a rest and given the house a good clean up. I am felling fine. For the present. More peace of mind. Frank is in work, He got work about six week ago. We dont know how long for. Have I told you before that Dad as put another house up on that piece of ground we had next to Elmbank. Heaps of people are crying all most for houses so Dad went and saw is bank people, ask them if he could have some money. He as got the house up & let at £1 per week. Its not so big as this, so if we can manage to live without wanting any of the rent in five years it will be ours. dad will be 71 by then. I am 62 next Saturday, Still able to do more than some of the bits of girls. All they seem to think about is getting out there hair & dress. The men seem to have the house to keep clean. it is awful to see some of the places they call home. I expect it is just the same where you are. More money they have more they want. When the men are out expect the country to keep them. Dad & I went to Ramsgate last Friday. Saw Wilf looking fine. Norman keep fairly well – is head still troubles him at times. He is not going to sit for his exam this year. It will be to much for him. Harold was supposed to come home from China in June. We have never seen or heard a word from him or her. I told you she came and saw us in March. Everything was alright, then ask for your address and Franks. He as not heard from them. I don’t expect you have.
There not much fresh news You have the papers, you can see all there is going on here. I will close hoping everythink is going well with you. Wishing you luck & health, With heaps of love
From your loving Mother

PS the new house we have names Sunny Bank

I will write to Mrs Harrison

November 30th 1933

Elmbank
Park Lane
Deal

Nov 30th 1933

My dear Alf

I was just glad to hear from you. I was getting worked up to a pitch when the mails came in. Nothink from you. Well Im cooled down now. I got your letter this morning. What a long time it was coming. Les is the only one I see until Norman comes home on Saturday. He always says just the same as Les – dont worry he is alright – someone is sure to let you know anythink was wrong.
By the papers, awful things are going on round about. New York lI always wonder where you are but still I am glad you keeping right away from all the right crowds that cum when all the awful things happen. At the present we are all well, pleased you are in the best of health. Thats the main thing. I chose Sunny Bank for the new house. We had some very happy times in old Sunny Bank as well as sad. I think my ladies miss you when you went away, then when you was missing. What fine bike rides and rambles we used to have. Often you left Wilf can’t  & Norman was always tired, We did go down the sand hills a few times but bike riding was so much like work. You and I never thought so in them days. Since you was home four years ago I have only been out of Deal three times. Twice to London for the day, once to Broadstairs when Wilf was ill. I allmost for get what the country like. I just sat & think about old happy times that I shall never have again.
Fancy your hair going grey so soon. I suppose it because you are dark. Mine as just began to go at the sides. That worried me a bit but my age & yours over 40 more than you but still dark people go grey sooner than fair & —— work turns some people grey. So long as you fell fit and well thats everything. I heard from Frank, Tuesday. He was still in work & they where all keeping well. I think this is all for now. Its nearly tea time so must close with heaps and heaps of love & all the best of luck
Your loving Mother

 Letter dated July 24th 1934

Elmbank
Park Lane
Deal

July 24th 1934

My dear Alf
I have been waiting & waiting for a letter from you. I havent had one this three months. I keep looking for the mail – still nothink. Are you busy or ill. What is wrong. I got seven photos about three weeks ago. Have been looking for a letter from you telling me what to do with them. all the people that i have shown them to like the full face one best. I like both. Norman as taken one to put in his bedroom at his digs. Les, Wolf, Frank all want one an I saying I I wont give give them any untill I here from you saying what I am to do with them. What awful hot weather we have been having not so hot by the papers. I see New York are having quite hot enough. I think we shall get it coolere. We are having our real rain this afternoon. Been raining since one o’clock. Now its time everythink
gets burnt up but there is may places worse off than us. Franks wife and three kids are staying with her mother at Walmer. Call them selfs to be more after they are down here. Been there a month come Monday. We are not gone on our first Grand Daughter. They are not looked after. It makes me fell ill when I have them coming. The place is like a pig sty in about ten minutes – Beat just sits down and lets them do just as they like. They have been here a month come Monday. I shall be glad when i hear her say they are going home. Frank comes down Saturday gets back in time for work Monday morning. He thinks his job may last another month or six weeks then he will have the winter to face. I could never put up with them here. I keep my place as nice as I can hoping to be able to do some apartment letting. I have only had one lady in so far for two weeks. Have nothing booked for August but the first three weeks in September everythink is very quiet. Dad & Norman are keeping very well. Some days I am not to bad. Cant put up with moaning so mind you write down and let me know what you are doing. With heaps of love and all good wishes
From your loving Mother

august 10th 1934

Elmbank

Park Lane
Deal

August 10th 1934

My dear Alf
I was please to receive a letter from you but so sorry you have been ill. I do hope you will get over it. Often people have to have a kidney taken out. I know a woman how as just had one. She is quite well again. Its hard luck just as you are getting on so well but mind you dont work to hard and over do it though its great to know one try hard without getting someone to hold your hand. If you were like one or two more of them just as you began to got on felled your hand with girls & a lot of silly other things. You would never have been able to do it, There is plenty of time yet -trust you for that. Look at what a mess Frank as made of his life and a wife like some fat old sow dont trouble about anything the three kids & him not much more than skin and bones. He went back to Tilbury, Monday in time to start work Tuesday having her & the children sent to Walmer as her mother was suppose to be ill. Soon as Frank was gone her mother and her had a set two (to) down here. They came for me to take them in. I soon got the money off Dad & sent them back to Tilbury. I would sooner be on bread and water than have my home upset with them. Norman will be glad when he comes home this week end to know they are gone. He said last week no peace. They would allways come down Saturday & Sunday. Frank use to come to Walmer Saturday soon as he left work – go back Sunday night. I heard from her saying they got back allright. She said Frank had gone on the dole because his boss had nothink for him to do untill next week. I am not going to take it. All in its time there is five of them to keep but if you have got a wife that let the children do just as they like -just sit & look on never trouble weather (whether) they mess there selves or what they are doing, it dont matter how much money they have. I am ease for money for the kiddies if they were looked after. They are pretty children- the eldest boy is sweet but they are badly fed. There faces are full of bones. As Dad says Frank just blames me for anythink. Les as the best wife so far. His little home spotless clean. Les thinks himself lucky if he can take home £2 10/- week and 12/6 to pay out of that for rent & three of them to live. She is a good manager. Thank goodness I have got them living in Deal and not some of the others.
I took Frank your photo he was out & Les took Eileen March. She came the other afternoon for your address. Stayed quite a time. My word what a change in her. When I went to the door, I wonder who it was. She looked like some chain (?? or is it choir) girl with her lips and face painted up. When I told Lydia she had been, she said “what did you think of her Mum?”. She said “when I go there to have my hair done -what a fright she looks. Quite spoilt her self. I supse its the fashion but how much better she looked without all that make up. I told you all about Dad’s garden in my last letter everything dugged up. I have not been down the sand hills for years. The last time I went out of the town was two years this coming November, that was when I went to Broadstairs when Wilf had a bad turn. He came home this week and was looking fine. He had one of your photos, & Norman one. Two I have kept my self. Frank never ask for one – said that were they to I let them have one that –—-
I must close now, my head begins to bump. Hoping you will let me knowhow you are getting better I hope. I thought there was somethink wrong why you kept me so long without a letter.
With heaps & heaps of love & all the best of health
From your
Loving Mother

PS Frank as just been to see me

I have asked Kathie as to whether her father had a kidney removed, as is implied in this letter, and he must have had an infection as he had both kidneys!

letter dated October 8th 1934

Elmbank
Park Lane
Deal

Oct 8th 1934

My dear Alf

I do wish you would write and let me k now how you are. I keep worrying and wish I new if you were better. I hope so, it would be hard luck for you just as you where getting on so well. we are all very well in health but very little work about. Dad as nothing in. Les as been out three weeks. I dont know about Frank. Have not heard from them since August. I expect they would soon write if he was out & I had five weeks apartment letting. Got through very well. I dont take only two or three people at a time. It is as much as I can do for single handed. They were very nice people. Now I suppose there is a long weary winter in front of us. Les says there is heaps on the dole. More than in January. By the papers, things are not all honey out your way. I cant think why people wont live in peace. Well dear, I send you all the papers, You get all the news. There is not much for me to write. I only hope you find time to write and let me know how you are.

with best wishes and love
from your loving Mum

Letter dated November 20th 1934

Elmbank
Park Lane
Deal

Nov 20th 1934

My dear Alf

I was pleased to get your letter. It eased my mind to know that you was well. I hope you keep so. You must take care your self. Mind what you eat, have everythink as plain as you can get it. Not so much tin stuff that dont do any one much good. We have had bad colds. When Norman gets one it sticks to him. You see he is along here weeks end for me to Doctor up. It does seem madness us living in Deal & the two boys paying home one ???? £2 8/- a week between them & not half looked after. If they were having that money home it would nearly find us all our food. I should have a much better time. They would take me to the cinema or a whist drive. I hate going anywhere by my self. Dad says he is fed up with Deal. There nothink here for us to stop he told Norman to look out for a nice house between now and next winter, Then he will have the house next door Sunny Bank nearly payed for. Then he can ask his bank to let him have enough to pay for another. He was 67 last August. He thinks it will be best for me to be where Norman is. He is getting well but you know he was never strong and if he left where he is now, he is well known & liked, he stands a much better chance of getting another job in Broadstairs or Margate & Ramsgate than here. This place might be growing but all the better class people are leaving because of the miners. As Norman says Dad will find quite as much as he wants to do in Broadstairs. We could get 25/- per week rent for Elmbank. We are trying to get him not to wait till next winter but I know he wont – not until there is another years rent payed off the house next door. We get a £1 per week for that an the bank done and more if he can get it. Gather, twice over our letters have crossed. I wonder if you have got one on the way. Now I hope so. I must close now with heaps of love and all the best of health
From your loving mother.

last letter sent from deal dec 12th 1934

Elmbank

Park Lane

Deal

Dec 12th 1934

My dear Alf
I had just been & posted a letter & the papers to you when your letter came. I was pleased you are keeping well. Health is everything. Well the final thing Dad was sixty seven (67) 18th of last August. I was sixty two or three 62 in October. I am not quite sure. My mother never told me my right age. Next the house next door. Just you put your think cap on. I wrote and told you when Norman was laying very ill summer before last, Dad had just started a house on his piece of land next to Elmbank & the Dr went & told him to pack up & stop the men knocking about. When it was finished I sent & told you we had let it for a £1 per week. If we could live without the rent it would take 5 years to pay for it & told you I had name it (Sunnybank) when I turn out I may find your letter where you thought it good as this is Elmbank that makes four we shall have some day. Blenheim Road and Elmbank are payed for with the money out of Elmbank and Sunnybank and if Dad gets cash he pays every penny he can get actually into the bank. It wont take long before they are the Mocketts. He just said its no good us staying here. The last job he done they never payed him for he can get plenty like that. He has about £200 owing him in Deal alone. Then again, Norman, a few months ago got a raise. Is wages are now 25/- per week. Now his landlady as found that out she wants more money. That will mean I shall have to help just as much as I have had to do nearly 3 years. Well I cant do it on what little bit of house keeping Dad lets me have. I often have felt like crying when Norman as left Monday morning & taken what money he would want left me with a few coppers to last all the week. That why I don’t go anywhere because if I did they would expect me to ask them here. I dont see going into Deal fun.

PS We have just heard from the furniture removers saying they are coming for our things.

 Dec 11th 1934

Elmbank
(After the 29th this month our address will be)
Inglewood
Vale Road
Broadstairs
Kent

Dec 11th 1934

My dear Alf

When you receive this I shall be busy packing up. Dad as made up is mind to live in Broadstairs as soon as we can get there. Norman as got a nice house for us through is boss – £800 house for £650. Dad went and saw his Bank manager. He said he could have the money so long as he let him have the deeds. Dad says with the boys money to help keep us we shall be able to leave the rent of Elmbank and Sunnybank to pay it off. Dad will stand more chance of getting work there. Normans boss told him he can find all the work he will want to do & if I am well enough I shall get a better chance of apartment letting there as there is nothing in Deal now for Dad an I in the way of work. I had five weeks let this summer. People around us could not understand me doing so well. Some of them never had a chance to let one week. every one that can clears out of Deal. Yes Norman as wrote to you, He can explain things better than I can. I dont know what I should do without him. He is ever so like you in is ways. I suppose it is going to the same school but Wilf ,since he pick up with a nice girl, he is much quieter and goes to church on Sunday. When he wrote & ask me if he could bring her home he said she is not a girl to pander and paint. Dad & I was very please with her. She is cook/housekeeper to a big man in Broadstairs. Soon after I posted my last letter to you I heard from Frank saying he was out of work and on the nack again. He came down this weekend, He said this makes the Three Christmas he as been out of work but he looked much better than he use to now the shipping is looking up. He is trying to go to sea again, We said what a shame he got married as he did. He is just a boy in his ways. Still we have never heard a word from Harold. Dont know if he is still in the navy or not or Horace & I am not moaning about them. Well dear, I don’t expect I shall get a chance to write to you again before Christmas so I wish the best of luck and health, will send you some little thing later. It is going to cost about £6 to move our lot over to Broadstairs. I have enclosed a card. Norman had them done for me. He says they looks better to send to some of the people that have stayed with me. I must close now. Wishing you all that good
From your ever
loving Mum

31 January 1935 after the move to Broadstairs

Inglewood
Vale Road
Broadstairs
Kent

Jan 31st 1935

My dear Alf
Many thank for your nice letter but we have not received the cable – guess if you sent it to Elmbank they would have sent it on. I expect it is lost. You say in your letter there nothink like moving to stir up your live and give you a heacache. Norman say why didnt you say & told to begin with. The house had been shut up about six months & that was a bit damp. Then the 28th Dec – the day we moved – the rain came down in sheets. It rained every day till next Friday. On the Saturday, Wilf & Norman were both bad with flu. They had about ten days of it. Then it was my turn. I thought I was going to say bye. the Dad had nearly all last week in bed. Since Saturday we have snow and bitter cold. What with one & another I hardly know weather I am in Broadstairs or Deal but once we get the nice weather and get over these colds I am going to like it better. I have got the boys to do little things for me when I was bad. Wilf got up in the night to see if I wanted anythink. Brought me some hot milk and put more hot water in the hot water bottle. He says I put the wind up him. We are ever so happy together. Five years in digs as done him good. He says if ever he had to leave home again he would marry the first girl he met. Both Wilf & Norman tell me now how they have to make shift with anythink. The landlady wants the money not them. With good plain food that I give them Wilf says his clothes too tight allready. There is another thing, for months in Deal I never knew what it was to get up in the morning without a head ack (headache)
Since I have been here I have not had one. When I was ill with flu or what ever it was my head never acked. It a very nice house – I wish you could see it. Les says it seem strang to him not having us in Deal. I expect he will soon come here to live. He says there is nothing in Deal. He as been out of work since Christmas week. Says nearly all the men in the building trade are on the dole. He wishes he were out of it. I have just wrote to Frank – we have not heard from him since he came to Elmbank the end of November. I sent him a few shillings for Christmas & never heard a word. I keep wondering what is the matter. I had a short note from Harold Christmas saying he was out of the navy – only his pension to live on. If he had the money he could do this that and the other. I have not answered it because they ought to have money. He never had to stop work because of the weather – there was his money wet or fine. She used to draw £2 7s 6d every Thursday without (means out of) his pay, as much as Dad allows me to find everythink & now to have to help keep Norman as well & not many weeks I miss sending a few shillings to Frank when he was out of work. If I could do it and keep out of debt so could they & save. I dont say there was often somethink I had to go without but thats all over n ow. I can get a glass of stout or wine if I want it. I have just got myself a bottle of winngannis. The Dr says that is a very good pick me up.
Harold told me when he was made first Class P.O. is pay was $4 5/- a week and there is only is two selfs. Dad says he as no money to hand them. They should have looked out after it when they had got it. He has got to look after his to get this house payed for. We have let Elmbank for £65 per year. That as got to help pay for this. Dad says because we have tryed hard to get a bit. Round some of them think we are millionaires. I think that is all for now. Hope you are still keep well. Health is everythink. I see in the daily paper you have got it very cold as well. My wirelesss as all gone wrong since we have been here. I do miss it. I dont think it can be fired right. I have had it about six years – it never went wrong in Deal. I use to get a lot of news from U.S.A on that. I shall have to look the mercury up. I dont know what the boys have done with them. Everything as been in such a muddle. Les sends them to us now. Wishing you the very best luck & health. With heaps of love from
your loving Mother

April 19th 1935

Inglewood
Vale Rd
Broadstairs

April 19th 1935

My dear Alf
I expect you have wondered why you have not heard I received your thurd letter yesterday I have ask Norman to write from me but he as been very busy at the office after his done there and had is tea he is off to one club or the other is what they can job master from the TOC H he as found it to much for him & I am please to say he is given it up if they will let him it was all very nice for him to have somewhere to go to when he was in digs now we are living here he don’t want so much of it why I have not wrote much in my last letter I said I was getting over the flu then I use to fell so bad after every think I eat I went across the road to the Doc he said I was a very sick woman I had got gastric flu very bad & I have been bad over a month I have not been able to eat – all drink but I am better there as been even such a lot of illness this part of the would (world) this winter I am expecting Lyd Leslie wife to move over Saturday to stay four a week or two as she as been in hospital being bad had somethink like ??? let herself go so long it was tuch and go with her for two weeks. you are wise not to leave your job untill you see a other. Frank as been out all winter again that is a worry to me half a weeks pay is better than nothink at all Norman as long leaves plenty of evening about and as just got 30/- per week he had better stay there than do nothing there is plenty would like his job. I must close now will write later I have kept saying what about my Alf no one writes to him with heaps of love your loving Mum

TOC H was a club opposite St Peters Church and is short for Talbot House.  Here is a link to the club https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toc_H

12th October 1935

Inglewood
Vale Road
Broadstairs

Oct 12th 1935

My dear Alf

At last I have found time to write. When I wrote last I told you to (two) ladies where coming to stay with me for two months. I new there would be plenty for me to do single handed. Since every day I got through very well only very tired some days. They have been gone three weeks now. The first thing I though(t) I had best do was give the house a good clean down. Just as I got it done then I had Norman in bed all last week. There is a very bad kind of flu going about. Its all on the chest & throat. The Dr said he could go out Thursday. He seems to be alright now but I think Dad as got it coming. It puts the wind up me. I heard from Les saying they had all been just the same. I was glad you are keeping well and geting on well. The war as started at last, they have been talking about it long enough in back ever sence the last – they have talked about the next. All I hope my boys dont
have to go -let them get on with it. Just at present I think you all are getting on very well for once. I have not heard from Frank for some time. I take it they are right. Les is working on his own. Plenty of work at present. We heard from Harold in July saying he had take a hotel in Portsmouth. He wanted Dad to come for the weekend. Dad never went. He said he expect when they got him there they would soon be wanting money. He said Horace and his boys were doing well. Norman has taken a snap of this house for you – just gone out with it in is pockett. Shall have to send it another time. I like Broadstairs very much. Its warmer than Deal & we have got Margate one of us & Ramsgate the otehre. It only takes about fifteen minutes to get either place. Wilf works in Margate, comes home to dinner every day & he only has one hour that will tell you how near we are.
Close now with best wishes, good health. Heaps of love and kisses from
your loving Mother

letter sent 26th May 1937

Inglewood
Vale Rd
Broadstairs

May 26th 1937

My dear Alf

Just a few lines well I fell (feel) like it. Hoping you are keeping well. In your last letter you said you was getting on fine, still working hard, We are all ok. This warm weather suits me much better. All the winter I got nasty cough, soon as it is warm I lose it & what a winter we have had. Rain day after day. You ask me when my birthday was. It is 21st October. Then I shall be 65. I dont think any of the other boys know. Dad will be 70 in August, He keeps wonderful well. Still keeps working don’t taking only small jobs. Norman keeps him going with work from is office.
Last week Mrs Akers came to see us. She use to live next door to us in Blenheim Rd. Since Mr Akers died she as made her home in London with her daughter. She wanted to know all about you. She looked just about the same. She is in her 78, been staying in Deal for a week came here for a day then on to London next day all by her self. She said I looked younger than I did when she last saw me – thats about three years ago. She says the same as I do – never want to go and live in Deal again. Les & Lyd came last week end. They would like to live here if he was sure of work. Frank is still in work, have had all the children ill this winter. I have not seen him for eighteen months. They have two girls & two boys. did I tell you Harold come in March for five days first we had seen of him for six years. Then Millie came the next week. She looked just about the same – plenty powder and paint. They, by what told us, are doing very well. They are running a hotel in Portsmouth , see Horace every days. Its seven years last Christmas when we saw him last. Harold says he work hards hard & they are all ok. Have three sons. The two eldest in good jobs. Horace often says he would like to see me but for peace sake he dont come. Have you got my Christmas parcel yet. I do believe I put 59 on it not 95, Well there dont seem much to tell you. We dont know any one here or you. Its very nice a quint part where we live no ???. Look right in to the police station.
x  Now I don’t want x
to say anthink about this when you write or I shall get into a row for telling tales but some week ago Wilf packed his girl up. She was coming her for two week now & then getting all she could out of him. When she got back to Maidstone she had some one else. They were engaged, going to be married some time this year. She & Normans girl are nurses in Maidstone hospital. I know Norman would like to be Wilf because sence is girl as been away from Broadstairs he says she is not the same – he is never right for her so did write and tell her she could have her freedom & get some one else. He says now he is older & got a good home he would rather stay with me till the last of me. I must close with the best of health and luck from your every loving
Mother

Wilf did marry a Gladys Hughes sometime, July, August or September of  1938  so I have to wonder if this it the girl that is mentioned in this letter. She had an affair and had twins by the other man so Wilfred divorced her. 

A card sent to Alfred by Norman and Teddy in 1948

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28th september 1948

Inglewood
Vale Road
Broadstairs

Sept 28th 1948

My dear Alf & Chrissie

I am writing to thank you very much for the load of food received August – everythink we were very grateful for. Cheese was a treat, nice, not seen any here for years. I gave the peanut butter to Norman. They like it very much but Dad and I dont but we share things. The frocks arrived September. The working frocks fit but I am afraid I shall not be able to wear them much this year – its getting cold here. Hope to be around to wear them another year. The rest I gave to Teddy. I wish the long sleeved one had fited (fitted) me. They were right for length & cross shoulders but tight round hips. They would have been warm. I don’t know if they fit Teddy – she has not said. I know they received parcel of food same week as us. Expect they have wrote to you by now. We live quite close to each other but dont but dont see a great lot of one another. Dad as been keeping very well this two months – hope he dont have a bad turn like he did last year just as the cold weather started.Trouble is we get food but it is not the same – no fat or goodness in it. Over a month we have not had eggs then only one each. We are thinking of having a shed put up & try to keep a few fowls but then again its food for them. Our age it eggs milk puddings & such things. Same butter and also bacon our lot for the week. One ration each, sugar half a pound a week each for everything. You can gas (guess) how pleased we were when we saw you sent us some. In your last letter you said Alf was going to have six weeks holiday. Hope you had nice weather and a good time together. I often look at photo of you & the children. I bet you are proud of . Has your Dad & Mam got back home yet – if so I hope they fell (felt) better for the change. Thank you both for all you have sent us – it must give a lot of trouble packing things.
Love to you all
Love from your loving  Mum

I very clearly remember the parcel that Florence talks about. There was a jar of peanut butter in it and also a large piece of bacon. I had never seen peanut butter before and was not too sure I liked it but, the bacon was a wonderful treat.  Sadly, both Florence and George died of flu  just five months after this letter was written.

Having done so much work on the family trees and on my blog I thought I would try to add as much of the information on my ancestors as possible and hope it will not become too boring. I have managed to find out odd snippets of information from old newspapers etc which I will try to include. I am going to type our direct ancestors in bold to make them more identifiable. It would seem that the majority of the Mockett ancestors were agricultural labourers  according to the census forms which started in 1841.

The furthest back I have been able to trace our branch of the Mockett’s is to John Mockett Junior who was born about 1640 in Ripple near Deal, Kent.

I have found records of a John Mockett ,son of John Mockett, baptised at Northbourne on  2nd October 1614. Northbourne is only 2 miles from Ripple where John Junior lived. I cannot help but think that they are also our ancestors. This John Mockett also seems to have had a daughter, Mary, who was baptised on 12th January 1611/12 and buried two days later on 14th January at Sutton which is only a 10 minute walk from Ripple.  He also had a daughter Elizabeth who was baptised on November 11th 1611.

It is very difficult to be sure of the older entries as so many children had the same christian name. Hugh, a cousin Jim Mockett and I are all agreed as far back as Stephen Mockett who married Elizabeth Leadner in 1815 but it is hard to be sure of who his parents were as there are two possible parents. However I have gone with the one born in Ripple where the majority of the family were living

—————

John Mockett Jnr and Mary Marsh

I have found his marriage entry in the Tyler Index when John Mockett Jnr married Mary Marsh on 10th October 1664

I believe that Mary was born in 1640 as I have a baptism for Mary Marsh daughter of Cornelius Marsh on 13 December 1640 at Northbourne.

John and Mary had five children

1/   John who was born and died in 1665

2/   Margaret born in 1668. A Margaret Mockett was buried on 31st May 1688 at Sutton, near Dover but I have no way of proving if it was this Margaret as there are no details of her age.

3/  John  who was born in 1669. He married Faithful Hammond in Capel Le Fearne on 7th November 1698. Faithful died in 1741 having given him 7 children.

4/  Nicholas, born 1671, baptised on 12th November 1671 and who married Elizabeth Sawyer on 6th January 1694. Elizabeth died in 1786 in Dover, Kent

5/   Mary who was born in 1673

SECOND GENERATION

John Mockett and Faithful Hammond

John, who was born in 1669 in Deal, Kent, married Faithful Hammond on 7th November 1698 in Capel Le Fearne, Kent.

John and Faithful had the following children

•  Elizabeth Mockett who was born in 1698 in Deal, Kent
• Margaret Mockett born in 1700 in Deal, Kent
• John Mockett who was born in 1705 in Deal. He died in 1706
• John Mockett born in 1707 in Deal. John married Hannah Martin and died on 25th December 1733 in Deal
• Nicholas Mockett born in 1712. Nicholas married Ann Barber on  7th February 1738. I have found that a Nicholas Mockett and his wife Ann and four children, were  relocated from St Lawrence to Deal in March 1745 and believe that it may well be this Nicholas. He was a husbandman. If someone fell on hard times and were unable to support themselves they were sent back to their home parish so that they could be paid for by (as in this case Deal) and not the one the parish that they  had moved to.
• Mary Mockett born in 1715 in Deal
• Richard Mockett born in 1710 in Ripple, Kent. He married Mary Mackney on 5th October 1734 in Great Mongeham, Kent. Mary died in 1769 in Ripple. I cannot be sure but  I think he died in 1770 in Ripple.

Faithful died in 1741 and was buried on 19th May 1741 in Deal at St Georges Church.

THIRD GENERATION

Nicholas Mockett and Ann Barber

Nicholas (1712-1754) was born to John and Faithful Mockett (nee Hammond)  in Deal. He married Ann Barber (1704-1788) on 7th February 1738 when he was aged 26.

Ann was born in 1704 – the daughter of John  Barber (1680-) and Elizabeth, his wife

Nicholas and Ann  had the following children:

•  A daughter Mary, who was born in 1741 in Deal.  This is quite a time after they married so I imagine that there may well have been more that either died or I have not found.
• John Mockett who was born in 1742 in Great Mongeham. He married Elizabeth Dewell. Elizabeth was the daughter of John and Martha Dewell and was born in October 1750
• A son called Nicholas who was born in Great Mongeham in 1745. I have found that an N Mockett was a proprietor of bathing machines in Deal in 1792 so am assuming that it is this Nicholas.

FOURTH GENERATION

JOHN MOCKETT & ELIZABETH DEWELL

John born in 1742 married Elizabeth Dewell on 6th July 1773 at Woodnesborough, Kent.

Elizabeth was  baptised at Eastry on 8th October 1749 and was the daughter of John (1720 -1802) and Martha Dewell (1751-1780)

John and Elizabeth had five children:

• STEPHEN MOCKETT  who was born in 1782 in Deal. He was my two Greats Grandfather. Stephen married Elizabeth Leadner on 6th May 1815 in Ripple near Deal
• A second son, Nicholas Mockett born in 1780. Nicholas married Martha Abbott and died on 25th March 1853 at the age of 73.
• A daughter, Ann who was born in 1774 in Northbourne, Kent
• A son, John born in 1776 in Northbourne, He married Sarah Spratling
• A son, William born in 1787 in Northbourne. He married a Sarah and died in 1872 in Northbourne

Elizabeth died on 6th January 1824 aged 71 and John died on 17th January 1830 aged 87.  Here is a photo of their grave at Woodnesborough

FIFTH GENERATION

STEPHEN MOCKETT & ELIZABETH LEADNER

My Great Great Grandparents

Stephen was born in 1782 and baptised in Deal on 13th October 1782. Stephen married Elizabeth Leadner on 6th May 1815 at Ripple, Kent.

From the marriage entry I find that Elizabeth’s father was called Thomas and that Stephen was working on a farm. Most of the Mockett men were agricultural labourers.   Thomas, Elizabeth and her father were not able to read or write and had to sign the certificate with an  X and have it witnessed.

Stephen and Elizabeth had five children.

• A son, Richard, who was born in 1817 and who married an Elizabeth
• A second son, Stephen, who was born in 1819 and who died in Deal on 7th February 1886 aged 67
• A third son, George, born in 1822
• A daughter, Elizabeth, born in 1824 in Ripple
• A son THOMAS, born in 1827 in Ripple. Thomas married Elizabeth Ratcliffe on 24th November 1854 in Ripple, Kent

SIXTH GENERATION

We can now go to Thomas and Elizabeth Mockett my  Mockett Great Grandparents 

I have also written a post on the descendants of Nicholas Mockett who was Grandson of John Mockett Junior as I had found some very interesting articles about them to include. To read it click here Descendants of Nicholas – Grandson of John Mockett Jnr

I found that I had connected the family with the wrong Stephen Mockett and so have had to revise this blog. Having written so much, I thought I would not just delete it and this is the tree descending from John Mockett Jnr and Mary Marsh, through their son John Mockett who married Faithful Hammond.

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John Mockett and Faithful Hammond

John, who was born in 1669 in Deal, Kent, married Faithful Hammond on 7th November 1698 in Capel Le Fearne, Kent.

John and Faithful had the following children

•  Elizabeth Mockett who was born in 1698 in Deal, Kent
• Margaret Mockett born in 1700 in Deal, Kent
• John Mockett who was born in 1705 in Deal. He died in 1706
• John Mockett born in 1707 in Deal. John married Hannah Martin and died on 25th December 1733 in Deal
• Nicholas Mockett born in 1712. Nicholas married Ann Barber on  7th February 1738. I have found that a Nicholas Mockett and his wife Ann and four children, were  relocated from St Lawrence to Deal in March 1745 and believe that it may well be this Nicholas. He was a husbandman. If someone fell on hard times and were unable to support themselves they were sent back to their home parish so that they could be paid for by (as in this case Deal) and not the one that they had moved to.
• Mary Mockett born in 1715 in Deal
• Richard Mockett born in 1710 in Ripple, Kent. He married Mary Mackney on 5th October 1734 in Great Mongeham, Kent. Mary died in 1769 in Ripple. I cannot be sure but  I think he died in 1770 in Ripple.

Faithful died in 1741 and was buried on 19th May 1741 in Deal at St Georges Church.

——————

Nicholas Mockett and ann Barber

Nicholas (1712-1754) was born to John and Faithful Mockett  in Deal. He married Ann Barber (1704-1788) on 7th February 1738 when he was aged 26.

Ann was born in 1704 – the daughter of John  Barber (1680-) and Elizabeth, his wife

Nicholas and Ann  had the following children:

•  A daughter Mary, who was born in 1741 in Deal.  This is quite a time after they married so I imagine that there may well have been more that either died or I have not found.
• John Mockett who was born in 1742 in Great Mongeham. He married Elizabeth Dewell. Elizabeth was the daughter of John and Martha Dewell and was born in October 1750
• A son called Nicholas who was born in Great Mongeham in 1745.

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JOHN MOCKETT & ELIZABETH DEWELL

John married Elizabeth Dewell on 6th July 1773 at Woodnesborough, Kent.

Elizabeth was  baptised at Eastry on 8th October 1749 and was the daughter of John (1720 -18020 and Martha Dewell (1751-1780)

John and Elizabeth had five children:

• STEPHEN MOCKETT  who was born in 1782 in Deal. He was my two Greats Grandfather. Stephen married Elizabeth Leadner on 6th May 1815 in Ripple near Deal
• A second son, Nicholas Mockett born in 1780. Nicholas married Martha Abbott and died on 25th March 1853 at the age of 73.
• A daughter, Ann who was born in 1774 in Northbourne, Kent
• A son, John born in 1776 in Northbourne, He married Sarah Spratling
• A son, William born in 1787 in Northbourne. He married a Sarah and died in 1872 in Northbourne

Elizabeth died on 6th January 1821 aged 71 and John died on 17th January 1830 aged 87.  Here is a photo of their grave at Woodnesborough

             GRAVE OF JOHN AND ELIZABETH MOCKETT AT           WOODNESBOROUGH

The Mockett family, taken in about 1918

    First Reunion in the garden at 12 Chaucer Road

From the left Gladys Smith (Lydia’s sister), Harold, Peter,Teddy, Leslie, Lydia,Chrissie, Kit, Judith, Frank

In front are Shirley (Peter’s wife holding Maureen and her own son), Richard, Milly & Hugh

             Wilf, Hugh, Alf, Harold, Richard, Norman

 Horace Mockett

16th July 1893- 1st May 1972

Horace was the first born son of George and Florence – to be followed by another eight sons. He was born in 1893 in Deal, Kent at the house rented by his parents. It was in the London Road and is described by Alfred as follows:

A row of 4/5 cottages on the right hand side as approaching Deal.150 yards from Upper Deal Church. One cottage in the middle had a well in the front garden. George William rented this cottage after his marriage and Horace was born here.  Just around the corner is the pub The Magnet, run by John, George Williams eldest brother in 1913 and 1914.

Horace, married Florence Lavinia Gillingham, in 1915 in Portsmouth.  Florence was born in Portsmouth on 31st March 1897 and died there on 27th November 1952.

In 1915 Horace was living in Lake Road, Portsmouth and in 1953 was working in the Royal Naval Dockyard as a bricklayer. I understand  from letters, that he also ran a public house as did his brother, Harold.

Horace & Florence had three sons:

• George William Frederick Mockett 1916 -1977 who married Doreen Patricia Lock and then Brenda Ventham in Hertfordshire
• Albert Richard (Tibbs)  Mockett in 1919 who died in the Middle East in WW2 on 1st December 1941 having enlisted on 1st September 1939. He was a gunner in the Royal Artillery and is on the Alamein Memorial
• Frederick James (Jim) Mockett who was born in 1926 and married Betty Doreen Martin in 1946 in Portsmouth. He died in 2008

Harold Thomas Mockett

1894-1963

Harold was the second of George and Florence Mockett‘s nine sons.  He was born on 31st December 1894 in Deal, Kent and was baptised on 3rd March 1895. According to Alfred’s notes, the family were living in Alfred Square.

Harold married Melinda Geraldine Farmer in 1922 in Canterbury. She was always known to us as Milly and was born in 1898 in East Stonehouse, Devon.

I have found the 1911 census, which says that Harold was then aged 16 and, was training at His Majesty’s Royal Naval Training Establishment in Shotley, near Ipswich. He remained in the Royal Navy for a lot of his working life.  His number in the Navy was  J10634. From the letters  his mother wrote, I have since found that he and Milly ran a hotel in Portsmouth after he left the Navy.

Harold appears to have taken part in WW1 in the navy and was awarded the Naval General Service Medal  for serving in Persia on the HMS Swiftsure between 1909 and 1920. He was also awarded the Star, Victory Medals  for WW1.and the RN Long Service and Good Conduct Medal 1925 – 1930.

When Harold left the Navy, he appears to have taken on a public house according to the letter that Milly has written to Alfred just below.

Harold and Milly did not have children and Harold died on 6th February 1963 at the Royal Portsmouth Hospital. He was living at 188 Guildford Road, Portsmouth at that time. He left £496 3s to his wife.

Harold died within four weeks of his younger brother, Wilfred.

Kathie has sent me this letter, obviously written by Milly, Harold’s wife,  of a reunion they had in what must have been about 1952. I am wondering if Kathie will be able to find the photo sent with the letter.

Bertie William Mockett

1897-1898

Bertie William was born in 1897 being baptised at St Georges Church, Deal on 19th May that year. The family were living at Stanford House, 105 Beach Street when he was born. He sadly died a year later and according to Alfred’s notes,  his mother was looking out of the upstairs bay window and saw him as he fell over the seawall. He was killed at the age of one. I have found this photo of Stanford House , where they were living. Unfortunately it is being decorated so has scaffolding up

  The next five sons  were all born at this house.

Walter Richard Mockett

1899-1915

Walter Richard – the fourth son of George and Florence -was born on 20th February 1899 at 105 Beach Street and was baptised on 23 April 1899 at St Georges Church, Deal.

He joined the Royal Navy on 28th May 1914 as a First Class Boy. He was on the SS Agamemnon in the Dardanelles when his ship was in action and he was wounded. He was transferred to the hospital ship as Hugh has a book by a senior officer who says that he saw young Walter smiling and cheerful as always. He sadly died on 5th March 1915 of the injuries he received and was buried at sea.

I went on a holiday a few years ago to Turkey and to the Dardanelles and saw the British memorial to all those who died. I found the plaque for the SS Agamemnon but sadly Walter’s name was not on it.

Leslie Stephen Mockett

1901 – 1960

Leslie was born on 5th June 1901 and was baptised at St Georges Church, Deal on 3rd July 1901. Leslie was also born at 105 Beach Street.

I have found a record showing that Leslie was in the Merchant Navy from 1918 to 1921. When he left the Navy he became a painter and decorator.

Leslie married Lydia Winifred Smith, (born 1904 in Deal), in 1928 in Deal and Lydia gave birth to a son, Peter the following year at 200 Beach Street, Deal, Kent.  In 1938, Leslie is in Kelly’s directory as living at 53 College Road, Deal and is a painter. I am not sure  at what stage they moved to Broadstairs but it appears to be in the late 1940’s, but they always lived in Howard Road- just behind Chaucer Road where we lived.  Lydia’s sister, Lena Cox,  lived in the same road and she had another unmarried sister, Gladys Smith, who is in the photo of the first Mockett reunion taken in the garden at 12 Chaucer Road.

Their son Peter, was born on June 7th 1929 in Deal. He  married a South African called Shirley and, eventually emigrated to South Africa with her, where he lived until he died on 17th December 2001 of a heart attack.

Leslie and Lydia adopted a daughter, Maureen who was born in 1944. Maureen still lives at St Peters having married David Hicks and having one daughter.

 Leslie died suddenly at Kingsgate Bay. He was painting Kingsgate House and sat in his car for his lunch and died there. Lydia continued living for many years at 21 Howard Road until she went into a home where she died in 1985 and her funeral was held at the Queens Road, Baptist Church (the same church where Wilfred married his first wife)

Frank Hubert Mockett

1905-1975

Frank was the sixth of nine sons born to George and Florence . He was born at Stanford House, 105 Beach Street, Deal which is now a listed building

He was born on 2nd April 1905. On his baptism certificate of 24th March 1906,   it states that his father is a bricklayer.

From the letters that his mother wrote to Alfred, it would appear that in the 30s and the depression, Frank was working in the dockyards and was often out of work. With 4 children, life was very difficult for them and he often had to ask his father for financial help. According to one letter, Wilf cycled the 70 miles  and back one weekend from Deal to Gravesend to take money and to see how they were. When he arrived there he had to go out to buy a cup and saucer so that he could have a cup of tea.

A few years ago I made contact with Audrey, a daughter of Frank, and went to visit her in Gravesend.  I discovered that she had been living a couple of roads down from my sister, Cheryl, and I had not realised this all those times when I went to visit Cheryl! By this time Cheryl had moved to Boston in Lincolnshire.  Audrey  was able to tell me a great deal about Frank and it appears that he was not at all like my father in nature!

Frank married Beatrice M Daft in 1929 and they had four children. The eldest was a son called Ronald, (1929 – 2003), followed by Norman (1930-1984). They then had two daughters, Audrey born in 1933 and Sylvia born in 1936. According to Audrey, Frank was in the Merchant Navy at that time and had his first mates ticket and had hoped to join the Queen Mary but this was not possible and so he was in the merchant navy during the war. However I have since found from a letter written by his mother Florence to his brother Alfred in the US that in 1932 he was working on the SS Avila and later out of work for some time.

During the war he  was on the SS Tottenham which was carrying lorries and ammunition  from Brazil when it was sunk on 17th June 1941.  This is a report of the sinking.

For 18 months the family only knew that he was missing and presumed dead. They  did not know that he had been picked up  and taken prisoner for a long time.  As a result he was a German prisoner of war for four years.

I have recently been in touch with two of Franks grandsons, Andrew and Adrienne Charlton – sons of Audrey.  They have kindly sent me some information on Frank and his family and included is this photo of him in the prison of war camp

He was then a prisoner of war in Poland near Bremen and here is the entry I found on Ancestry about him with his details.

F H Mockett
in the UK, British Prisoners of War, 1939-1945
Name: F H Mockett
Rank: Able Seaman
Army Number: 1112786
Regiment: Merchant Navy : Officers, Ratings & Foreign Seamen
POW Number: 331
Camp Type: Marlag und Milag Nord (Milag)
Camp Number: Mil. N.
Camp Location: Poland
Name of Ship: Tottenham
Section: Merchant Navy : Officers, Ratings & Foreign Seamen

The camp was liberated in June 1945 and here is an article about the camp.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marlag_und_Milag_Nord

According to Audrey, Frank was  very jealous and very possessive of his wife. Beatrice did not have any affairs while he was a prisoner, even though she believed him to have died, but when he finally came back she did confess to having gone out with a couple of men. I understand that as a result she had two black eyes and often was hit by Frank, to the extent that a neighbour offered to be a witness for her if she needed one.   He was so unlike my father who would never have raised a hand to anyone.

I believe that Frank worked on the docks at Tilbury after he left the merchant navy.

Audrey clearly remembered coming with Sylvia to stay with my parents at the outbreak of war when she was aged 6 and her sister aged 3. They came to stay as Beatrice was so ill with her weak heart  and was pregnant with her fifth child, She was so ill that they could only save one of them and so saved the mother.  Frank was looking after his two older sons. Sylvia at the time was suffering from rickets and apparently the rickets was much improved when she left Broadstairs as Audrey said they had to go in the sea a lot, although I am not sure that sea water helps rickets and that it is probably more due to diet. Having read the letters from Florence, it appears that Frank was out of work so much during the Depression, that food must have been very short in the home and that could have caused the rickets.

Audrey thinks that my mother was pregnant with me as, my father would come home from work and scrub the kitchen floor for her, to save her from doing it.  She said that my parents then went to Scotland and, as they were not allowed to go with them, the two sisters went to stay at Inglewood with the  Grandparents. I am sure Audrey was right about my mother being pregnant as she was about 3 months when she went to Kilmarnock with my father, before he was posted to the desert. Audrey was aged 78 when she gave me all this information so had an incredible memory.

Audrey left school at the age of 15 and went to London to work but her mother was ill by then. Frank insisted on Audrey giving up her job and returning home to look after her mother, which she did for two years. Beatrice died in 1951 at the age of 44.

After her mother died, Audrey returned to work in London and came home one evening to find her younger sister, Sylvia, in floods of tears. When Audrey tried to find out the problem, Frank lost his temper with her and said that he was throwing Sylvia out of the house and that Audrey could go too. They were only aged 14 and 17!  Audrey believed it was because he was going out with Kit (Kathleen Davy) who lived in the same road – Crouch End, Chapel St Mary, with her five children and that Kit wanted Frank’s daughters out of the house before she would marry him- which they did in Thurrock in 1954.  Audrey and Sylvia went to live in Wimbledon with their Uncle Wilfred (the eighth son of George and Alice Mockett ) and his second wife, Bertha, where they stayed until Wilf moved to Headcorn. Wilfred was much more like my father and he and Bertha invited the girls to remain with them and to move to Headcorn with them.  However they did not do so as, I believe that Sylvia had a boyfriend at that time whom she eventually married,

Audrey recalls Horace going to visit Wilfred when they were staying in Wimbledon and taking his son Jim with him. Jim and Sylvia went out for the evening together.

I gathered that she was extremely fond of both my parents as all my cousins seem to have been!

I have just recently been sent a couple of letters that  Florence wrote to Frank’s brother Alfred who was in the US. From the letters I gather that Frank was out of work in 1933 and 1935 which does not quite tally with what Audrey told me. I have posted the letters under Norman’s parent’s  post.

Frank died in 1975 and Kit died in 1988

Frank and Beatrice had four children:

• Ron Mockett married but  I know little about him as I think Audrey and he must have fallen out at some time. She did tell me that she has no photos of her father as Ron kept everything after he died. Ron died in 2003.
• Norman John was born on 16th December 1930. He married Pat but, unfortunately he was hit by a lorry which broke his back and as a result he was in a wheelchair and the paralysis eventually moved to his hands and arms. Sadly he got cancer and his wife nursed him until his death in 1984.
• Audrey married Alfred Charlton and they had two sons, Adrian and Andrew. Alfred was a manager for a supermarket called Priceright, and I gather that their marriage went through a bad patch as all the young girls there were too great a temptation for him. They were trying to patch things up when he was on the A2 in a cycle race when he was hit by a lorry and killed at the age of 43 in 1974 leaving Audrey to bring up two young sons, She had some compensation, but lost money a couple of times and so had to count the pennies. She worked until she was aged 68.

• Sylvia married Henry A Bedford in 1955 in Surrey and I know she had a family but know nothing more about her.

Alfred Ernest William Mockett

1909-1996

Alfred was born on 9th April 1909. He was the seventh son and was born at Stanford House, 105 Beach Street. Alfred said in his notes that he thought that the house was run as a B&B.

There is more information about Alfred and his parentage on the page about my Grandparents, under Alice Florence.

I always understood that Alfred was in the merchant navy and jumped ship in  1928 in New York. Kathie has just emailed me this message:

Yes, he did jump ship but it was a job offer by an American captain who ran a ship and needed someone aboard and the pay was 3 times what he was earning so, yes, he took the job!!! that very night. and the rest, as they say, is history

He lived there for the rest of his life. I have found that he returned to England on the Cunard ship, Aquitania, in 1930.

He married Christina Beaton Macinness from Scotland in New York on 10th September 1938 in the Presbyterian Church in New York.

In the US census of 1940 they are living in Rutgers Street, Belleville, Essex, New Jersey.

From information that Kathie has sent to me, Alfred enjoyed acting and singing and she has sent me this lovely photo of Alfred with Kathie in the choir together

Al & Chrissie came back to visit us all in Broadstairs in 1958 and we had a photo taken in the garden of 12 Chaucer Road. Al and Norman went to Dover to visit their old school and I found this report of their visit in a copy of the school magazine

Al did well for himself going into advertising, and working for the Beneficial Finance company. They had a lovely house in New Jersey which I visited when I was flying and also took my parents to on their first ever flight in October 1967.

Al and Chrissie had two children:

• Douglas born 17th June 1940. Douglas married Sonia and they had twin boys, Andrew and Christian.

• Katherine Alicia Mockett who was born on 12th June 1944 . Kathie married Jack Palmer on May 10th 1968 and they had two daughters. Alyson and Amanda. Kathie later married John Oberteuffer on 22nd February 1983 in St Croix, Virgin Islands where Al and Chrissie had a house.

Al always said that he did not think that George William was his father. He apparently had been given a locket by his mother when he went to America which had a photo of him as a  young boy. One day he dropped it and the photo fell out revealing a photo of the local Deal doctor in the back. He felt that he was his father and that it explained why he was always the son sent to the surgery to collect prescriptions and why the doctor always asked him about his schooling and how he was getting on.  Just recently Kathie had her DNA done and this was confirmed when it came back showing not a single link to a Mockett but plenty to the Doctor – Alfred Mason. I think it is so amazing to find out that ones Grandmother had an affair over 100 years afterwards.

Here are photos of the locket that Kathie kindly sent me

Wilfred Arthur Mockett

21st January 1911- 6th January 1963

I know little about Wilfred’s early life. He was born on 21 January 1911. From letters from Florence, I found that he worked in Broadstairs for some years, living in digs. I do know that he worked as a barber in Wimbledon for many years and remember going to stay with them there for a few days with my parents

Wilfred married Gladys M Hughes in 1938 at Queens Road Baptist Church. I have copies of two newspaper reports and understand that the bride was attended by three bridesmaids, one was her sister and the other two were nieces. The best man was my father, Hugh Norman Mockett.

According to Audrey, Gladys had an affair and as a result of which she gave birth to twins. As a result she and Wilfred divorced, and he married Elizabeth Bertha Hatton in 1950. Bertha had been married before (her maiden name being Carpenter), and she had a daughter Joan who always lived with them both as she was slightly disabled.

Wilfred moved from Wimbledon to a bungalow called Holdfast in Griggs Lane, Headcorn which was on a farm. This must have been in the late 1940’s or very early 1950 as I remember going to stay with them when I was about 12 and one year Bertha took me hop picking with her.

Cheryl and I were reminiscing about Wilfred just now and she told me a lovely story of when she was aged about 4 and went to stay with Wilfred and Bertha. We were going camping in Italy and were unable to take Cheryl with us as she was not adopted at that stage and we had no passport for her.  Bertha gave Cheryl a basket and instructions to go out and look for eggs under the hedges etc ready for them to make a cake. Wilfred asked Cheryl if she knew how to tell a good egg from a bad egg and when she said that she didn’t he explained. He said that you threw them into the water and the good eggs sank and the bad eggs floated. Having collected the eggs, this dear little girl carefully threw them all into the pond and found that they all sank! She was found by Bertha, sometime later, on the side of the pond and with an empty basket

Wilfred died on 6th January 1963 and his wife, Bertha died in 1990. When Wilfred died (four weeks before his brother, Harold) he left an estate of £8180

Hugh Norman Mockett

Hugh Norman – always known as Norman- was the youngest of the nine sons and here is his story:  Norman

Thomas MOCkETt 1827-1898

All the information that I have about Thomas comes from census forms and the various certificates that one is able to find.

Thomas was the son of Stephen Mockett 1782-1827, a labourer, and Elizabeth Leadner 1783 -1875. It would appear that his father died the year that Thomas was born and his mother died when he was aged 3.  On the marriage certificate it is witnessed by John Mockett who I believe is a cousin of his.

Thomas married Elizabeth Ratcliffe on 24th November 1854 in Ripple Church.

Thomas and Elizabeth were living with her family – Daniel Ratcliffe (born in 1806) and his two daughters – in Ripple in the 1861 census and by that time they had a son and two daughters of their own. Elizabeth’s mother was Sarah Fials  who married Daniel Ratcliff on 26th February 1831  in Ewell, Kent and who had died in 1859. I have not been able to trace Daniel Ratcliff back to find his parents.

Ten years later, in 1871 they are living in their own home and now have 9 children. By 1881 they are living at Upper Deal Road, Deal

Thomas and Elizabeth  had 13 children of which George William Mockett – my Grandfather – was the eighth

The children were:

• John Mockett born in 1857. John married Agnes Miriam Gunner in 1898 at Eastry in Kent although she was born in Wandsworth. According to the 1901 census, John and Agnes had moved to St Lawrence in Ramsgate and at the ages of 43 & 41 were running the Rose Inn in the High Street there. The Rose Inn has now been demolished and has a Tesco on the site, with BodySym behind which is the physiotherapist that I go to.

According to notes from Horace Mockett, this John Mockett was running the Magnet Pub in Deal in 1913 and 1914 and I have found this photo and list of licencees of that pub which does show that Horace is correct so I assume that they moved back to Deal at some point.  http://www.dover-kent.com/Magnet-Inn-Deal.html

• Sarah Elizabeth Mockett who was born in 1858 in Great Mongeham, near Deal. Sarah died at the age of 6 in 1864

• Frances Ann Mockett was born the following year in 1859 . Frances married a Richard Canney in 1881 in Eastry. Richard was a  bricklayer and a widower  with a daughter and in the 1881 census Frances was his housekeeper at 134 Middle Street Deal. Richard  died in 1917 and she then married Arthur Parker in 1924 but sadly Frances died in 1927 in Deal only three years after marrying him.
• Stephen Mockett born in 1861 in Ripple, Deal. He married Eliza Ann Goodban in 1886 and they had five children. Stephen was a bricklayer and by 1911 is described as a builder. He lived in Upper Deal Road and also in Holly Cottage, London Road, Deal. Stephen died in 1938 in Deal.

Through pure chance, I was contacted by a lady called Jane Bushell, who had visited Thelune cemetery to see the grave of a relative, the very next day after my daughter had visited it for me. It appears that Jane is a second cousin of mine through the Pysden family. However, she put me in touch with Judith Davies nee Gaunt, who is related through the Pysden side too, Judith has written some very interesting books about Deal and its traders which I purchased. I found these photos of Stephen Mockett in it and as a result managed to speak to his Great Grandson, also a Stephen, who lives in Deal. Hopefully I shall meet up with him at some point. I have since bought a book, called Tradesmen of Deal and Walmer and written by a second cousin, Judith Gaunt. In it there are the following photos of Stephen.

The amazing thing is that I was given a Deal newspaper by a friend who knew I was a Mockett. In it was a photograph of Rita Mockett being presented with a cup for having won a dance competition. When I showed this to Hugh, he said my thoughts : that Rita looked so like me at that age. When I spoke to the Great Grandson Stephen it transpired that she was his sister and had died a few weeks beforehand so  sadly we could never meet.

• Phoebe Mockett born in Great Mongeham in 1862. According to the 1881 census Phoebe was a patient in the Kent and Canterbury Hospital aged 18.  Phoebe married Alfred Hopkins in 1893 in Strood, Kent. In the 1891 census Phoebe was a servant in Northfleet and married Alfred two years later. In the 1901 census they are living in Northfleet with two sons and also have Alfred’s father living with them as well as 3 boarders.  Alfred was working in an iron mongers. They had two children and Phoebe died in 1909 back in Deal. The 1911 census describes Alfred as a widower and a domestic gardener still  living in Northfleet

• Ellen Mockett born in 1864 in Great Mongeham married William Allen in 1895 at the old parish church of Walmer – across the main road from Helen’s school, Leelands.  My Grandfather – George William – was a witness at their wedding.

Ellen had quite an interesting life as in 1881 she was a servant at 8 Middle Street, Deal  and ten years later she was in Weston Super Mare as a servant to Dowager Countess Caroline A. Cava but she married William Allen  in 1895 back in Kent.

In 1901 they were living in Felixstowe when William was a Regimental Sargeant Major in the army. They had their first child, William John in 1896, he was born at Woolwich. They then had a second son, Herbert Allen,  in 1899 born in Woolwich and  their third child – a daughter Ellen Rose – was born in Gibraltar in 1902. Ellen died in 1929 in Deal, Kent.

• Thomas Mockett was born in 1866, in Great  Mongeham. He married Elizabeth Groombridge in 1894 in Dover. In 1881 at age 15 Thomas is a live-in general labourer in Upper Deal Road, and his brother Stephen is living at the same address also a servant. I have  been unable to find him in the 1891 census but  ten years later, in 1901, Thomas  is a bricklayer living with his wife and two children in Upper Deal Road. By the time of the 1911 census, his children have all left home and he is living at 15 Radigunds Road, Dover with his wife and five  boarders. Thomas died in late 1943

• George William Mockett – my Grandfather- born on 18th August 1867 at Deal. He married Alice Florence Pysden who was born in Ramsgate in 1872 and had nine sons.

• Charles E Mockett born in 1869 in Great Mongham. Charles married Adelaide Celia Philips in June 1895 in Eastry. Charles and Adelaide had two sons,  Lewis C born in 1898 and who died in WW1 on 3rd October 1918. He served in the 8th battalion of the Tank Corps and died of his wounds.  The second son, Philip Edward was born in 1907 in Deal and died in 1988 in Worthing. Sussex

• Richard Mockett born 1872/3 as he was baptised on 26th January 1873. Richard was a visitor footman in 1901 at Ascott House, Wing, Buckinghamshire when it was owned by Leopold De Rothschild

In 1911 he is butler at Stanway House owned by Elcho who does not appear on the guest list of 1901.

Richard married Edith Theedom Jennings who gave him 5 children and he died in 1939 in North Waltham, Norfolk.

• Frederick J Mockett born in 1872 and who died in Ashford in 1937. Frederick married Emma Louisa Coleman in 1899 and they had 2 sons. Frederick was a milkman
• Alice Mockett born in 1874. According to the 1891 census she was a cook at the same address as her sister Phoebe was a servant  at 14 Barch Road, Northfleet. She married Stephen Robert Newing in 1899 in Strood, Kent and in 1911 they were living at Spout House, Lympne, Hythe, Kent with three children. Stephen was described as a Naval Pensioner. Stephen died in 1949  and Alice the following year, both in Chatham
• Jane Elizabeth Mockett born in 1878 in Great Mongeham. Deal

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Elizabeth Mockett nee RATCLIFF

1833-1898

Elizabeth was born in Ripple in 1833 to Daniel Ratcliffe (1803- 1884) and his wife Sarah nee Fials  (born  1811- 1859) and daughter of James and Elizabeth Fials

Elizabeth’s father was an agricultural labourer and he and his wife married in 1831 and had the following ten children

• Elizabeth and a son William  both in 1833 so probably but not definitely twins
• Daniel in 1834
• Margaret in  1835
• John in 1838
• Sarah in 1840 or 1841 and who possibly died in 1859
• James  and Phoebe both in 1842
• Mary 1849
• Ann in 1858

In the 1851 census Elizabeth at the age of 18 is a servant in Upper Deal

In 1861 Daniel is a widower and he has his two daughters Anne and Mary living with him and also his son in law, Thomas Mockett with his wife Elizabeth and three of their children, Frances, John and Sarah.

Daniel Ratcliff who was an agricultural labourer appears to have fallen on hard times and in both the 1871 and 1881 census he is in the Eastry  workhouse before dying there in 1884.

I have found an interesting article which shows  what the workhouse was like in the days that Daniel was there:

http://www.workhouses.org.uk/Eastry/

Now we can read about my Grandparents-  George William and Alice Florence Mockett

George William Mockett

18th August 1867-11th March 1949

George William was born on 18th August 1867 to Elizabeth Mockett nee Ratcliffe aged 34 and Thomas Mockett aged 40. Thomas and Elizabeth had married on 24th November 1854 at St Leonards Church, Upper Deal.

They appear to have lived in Upper Deal most of their married lives but were at Beach Street by 1911.  Thomas Mockett was an agricultural  labourer on his marriage certificate and Elizabeth was a servant.

George was the ninth of 13 children and his siblings were as follows:

• John Mockett born in 1857. John married Agnes Miriam Gunner in 1898 at Eastry. Miriam had been born in Wandsworth.
• Sarah Elizabeth Mockett  who was born a year later in 1858. Sarah died at the aged of 6 in 1864
• Frances Ann Mockett who was born in1859. Frances  married Richard Canney in 1881 at Eastry and died in Deal in 1927.
• Phoebe Mockett born in 1862 who married Alfred Hopkins in 1893 at Strood and died in 1909
• Ellen Mockett born 1864 . Ellen married William Allen at the old parish church of Walmer in 1859 and George William was a witness at her wedding.
• Stephen Mockett was born in 1862 and married Eliza Ann Goodban. Stephen died in 1938
• Thomas Mockett born in 1866. Thomas married Elizabeth Groombridge in Dover in 1894. He died in Folkestone in 1943
• George William Mockett was born next in 1867 – my Grandfather
• Charles Edward Mockett born in 1869 and married Adelaide Celia Philips in 1895 in Eastry.
• Frederick James Mockett (called Frank) was born in 1871 and married Emma Louise Coleman in 1899 in Ashford Kent where they continued to live
• Richard Mockett was born in 1873. Other than in the 1881 census when he was a student aged 7. I cannot be sure what happened to Richard but have found one working in Gloucester as a servant which could just be him as I cannot find a death certificate
• Alice Mockett was born in 1874 and married Stephen Robert Newing in 1899 in Strood, Kent. Alice died in 1950 aged 76
• Jane Elizabeth Mockett was born on 18th May 1878 and married Albert Stanley Howard in 1915 in Eastry.

Typing this out makes me so glad that I was born when I was and not 100 years earlier or I would certainly have had more than 3 children!

George William and Alice had nine sons and the only photo I have of them as a family is this one

Sadly I do not know a great deal about George William as he and Florence died when I was just 7 years old. I do remember going  up to see them on my own once. It was not a long walk up the Vale to their house but I remember feeling very grown up going alone.

The information that I do have about him all comes from the census forms. In 1871 he is still a toddler aged 3, living with his parents and  8 siblings in Upper Deal Road.

These articles about Upper Deal at that time are quite interesting

http://www.eastkenthistory.org.uk/place:upper-deal

http://www.eastkenthistory.org.uk/place:photos-around-upper-deal

The second link shows Upper Deal as it must have looked in the time that George William lived there – so different to today!

In 1881 George William is still living there with his family and is a farm labourer but ten years later he is still living with his parents but is a bricklayer. This is obviously when he started on his career as a builder.

George William and Alice Florence Pysden married on 10th September 1892. I have a copy of their marriage certificate and it states that his father Thomas is a labourer and Alice’s father – Thomas Pysden – is a blacksmith from Upper Deal. The witnesses were George’s brother Stephen and Alice’s sister, Emma Kate Pysden.

George and Florence wasted no time in having children as the first of nine sons was born the following year.

•  Horace George was  born on 16th July 1893.
• Harold Thomas followed the following year on 31 December 1894 and
• Bertie William was born in 1897. Sadly he died in June 1898 and Teddy used to say that it was because the nanny let the pram fall over the sea wall but I have no proof of this at all.
• Walter Richard followed the following year in 1899. Sadly he died of injuries in WW1 sustained when the ship Agamemnon came under fire in the Dardanelles. Walter was injured and died a few days later. Hugh has a book about that war and it mentions Walter in it. I have found this site about the war memorial at St Georges Church, Deal, with Walter’s name on it.  http://www.roll-of-honour.com/Kent/DealStGeorge.html
• These sons were followed by Leslie Stephen in 1901
• Frank Hubert in 1905
• Alfred Ernest William in 1909
• Wilfred Arthur in 1911  and finally
• Hugh Norman in 1913 (always known as Norman)

I shall be writing about the sons in later pages.

I have been unable to find the family in the 1901 census but by 1911 they are living at 155 Beach Street, where Norman was born.

I have recently found that in WW1 George joined the RAF in some way. It does not give me much information about his service and as he must have been 47 when the war started I can only assume it was in some role on the ground.

I have a copy of a letter that Norman sent to Alfred in June 1933 and the address is Elmbank, Park Lane, Deal so I presume he is living there with his parents.

When Norman was aged about 20 he moved to Broadstairs to work at the estate agents called Daniels at the top of Broadstairs High Street and so George and Florence moved there too in January 1935 buying Inglewood in Vale Road having found it thanks to Norman.

Florence and George must have had a very worrying time during the war.  Having given birth to nine sons they had lost one son as a baby and a second in WW1 and then in WW2 they had the two older sons in the Navy. The fifth son,  Frank, was a prisoner of war for 4 years in Poland after his ship had sunk off Buenos Aires and they did not know for 9 months if he was alive or dead and then my father was away, fighting in the desert for nearly five years. Fortunately, both Frank and my father came back safely after the war.

Alfred had jumped ship in the late 1920’s  and was living in America during the war.  Florence wrote to him regularly, which must have been quite a job for her as she would have left school at 10 and writing was not an easy task. When she wrote, she never used any punctuation and very few capital letters making her letters difficult to read. I have typed up some of her letters  and put them in a separate post.

From the letters, I have realised what a hard time they had during the 30s in the Depression. Florence took in guests (I think they were holiday makers rather than lodgers from the way she talks about it) and George sold off his work tools to save having to pay 6/- 6d (32.5p in todays money) a week for storage for them.

There was a big epidemic of Spanish Flu in 1948/49 and George died of it on 11th March 1949 followed two weeks later by Florence ,also of the flu. I remember my mother saying how incredible it was that they were in separate rooms when ill and although she did not think that they were very happy together, Florence knew that George had died without being told.

George left an estate valued at £5593 17s 8d between the seven sons and in todays money it would be worth about £197,578.86. Now in January 2022, Hugh found that the house is up for sale at the sum of £700,000.

———————————————

Alice Florence Mockett

1872 – 25 MARCH 1949

Alice Florence nee Pysden and always known as Florence, was born at the end of 1872 in Thanet. I cannot be positive but think she was born in Ramsgate as her parents were married at St Lawrence Church Ramsgate, and she was baptised at St Georges Church in Ramsgate. Alice never really knew how old she was as, from a letter written by her in 1933, she says her mother never really told her. She was guessing then that she was aged 65 or 66.

I only seem to have the three photos of Florence, the one above, the one with her seven surviving sons and one with Wilfred and Alfred. I have already added the family photo in the posts about her husband George William and her son, Norman so will not do so again

Her parents were Thomas Pysden  ((1849-1899) and Alice Sarah Pysden (1850- nee Morisson. Thomas was born in Margate in the parish of St John’s Church and Alice was born to David Morison and his wife Ann nee Collins at Ramsgate. I have traced the Pysden family back to the early 1600s. The Pysdens mostly lived in Margate and worshipped at St John the Baptist church there and I was most fortunate as someone had posted all the church records online so I was able to trace all the families back.

This photo of St John’s church was taken from a postcard dated November 1905

Thomas and Alice had ten children with Alice Florence being the eldest. Her parents moved to Deal shortly after Florence was born as her father is  then working in Walmer as a blacksmith and all her siblings were born in Deal

Florence was followed by:

Emma born in 1873
Jane 1878 – 1891
Julia born in 1878. In the 1891 census Jane was a nurse girl at the age of 13.
Thomas born in 1881
George born in 1884
Ellen born 1885
Jesse born 1887
William in 1890
Walter in 1892. In the 1911 census Walter was a hairdressers assistant aged19
Florence gave birth to nine sons with 20 years between the first and last. Either she or her husband George, recorded the births on the back of the family photograph from 1919 and this is a what they wrote

I do know that when I was born, after having 9 sons of her own, that Florence would smock nightdresses for me for the sheer pleasure of having a girl to do it for. She did have other Granddaughters but they did not live close by as I did.

My cousin, Kathie, has kindly sent me copies of letters written by Florence to Kathie’s father Alfred, in America and I thought it might be of interest to add them to this  blog and have set up a separate post of them. They give a great insight into life during the depression and to our family and have helped me to find where Frank was when his ship was sunk and where he was a prisoner of war for four years.  Florence would have left school at the age of 10 and this is evident from the fact that the letters are written exactly as she spoke and with no punctuation whatsoever.

I have just had an email from Kathy. Her father, Alfred, always said that he thought his father was not George William but was the doctor called Alfred Mason. I do remember hearing that my Grandmother had a photograph of the doctor on the piano. Kathy said that when Alfred left home to join the Merchant Navy, his mother gave him a locket with his photo in. One day he dropped the locket and the metal ring holding his photo in fell out. Alfred then looked at the photo more carefully and found a photo of Alfred Mason behind it which must have been why he said he thought that was his father.  She also told me that he was always the one sent to fetch the doctor or to go see him to get medecine for the family.  and that whenever he went to see him, Dr. Mason always sat him down and asked about him, his schooling, his studies.
Kathy has had her DNA done a few years ago and has found a lot of cousins on the Pysden side but none at all on the Mockett. She also has cousins on the Alfred Mason side. I find it quite incredible to think that over 110 years later, we realize that Alice had an affair.

Kathy has now kindly sent me photos of the locket showing Alfred at the age of about 6 or 7 and the photo of  Dr Alfred Mason (I wonder if that is how my uncle got his name)  in the locket.

Florence died at Inglewood, Vale Road, Broadstairs two weeks after her husband. Her will left an estate of £1197 10s 3d which in todays money would be worth about £25000.

Norman’s brothers